Columbia  SEntbersttg  3Lectures 


POLITICAL   PROBLEMS   OF   AMERICAN 
DEVELOPMENT 

GEORGE  BLUMENTHAL  FOUNDATION 
1907 


COLUMBIA     UNIVERSITY   LECTURES 


POLITICAL  PROBLEMS 

OF 

AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 


BY 


ALBERT   SHAW,   LL.D. 


- 


Nefo 
THE   COLUMBIA   UNIVERSITY   PRESS 

1907 
All  rights  reserved 


COPYRIGHT,  1907, 
BY  THE  COLUMBIA  UNIVEESITT  PEES8. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.    Published  June,  1907. 


J.  S.  Gushing  &  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith  Co. 
Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


PREFACE 

THE  present  volume  is  made  up  of  a  series  of  lectures 
delivered  as  the  opening  course  upon  the  new  Blumenthal 
Foundation  in  Columbia  University.  The  lectures  are 
printed  as  they  were  delivered,  with  no  material  changes. 
It  would  seem  desirable  to  say  in  this  prefatory  note  that, 
quite  regardless  of  the  titles  assigned  to  the  separate 
lectures  (which  here  appear  as  chapters),  the  work  is  to 
be  taken  as  a  single  essay  or  dissertation.  We  are  only 
at  the  beginning  of  the  history  of  a  great  blended  family 
of  white  men  of  European  stock  who  have  made  their 
homes  in  what  was  so  recently  the  wilderness  of  North 
America,  and  who  are  working  out  for  themselves  a  life 
of  varied  human  relationships  in  their  effort  toward  the 
realization  of  certain  ideals  and  standards. 

Thus  far  the  history  that  they  have  made  has  been 
that  of  an  initial  period  of  development,  and  of  adaptation 
to  the  conditions  presented  by  a  new  country.  This 
volume  deals  with  the  political  phases  of  that  initial  period 
of  development.  It  attempts  to  give  some  analysis  of  the 
nature  of  politics  in  American  life,  and  of  the  problems 
of  a  larger  sort  which  have  presented  themselves  for  solu- 
tion through  political  means.  The  theme  of  the  book  is 
the  struggle  of  the  American  people  to  realize  national 
unity  upon  the  basis  of  a  homogeneous  and  well-con- 
ditioned democracy. 

Although  the  several  chapters  discuss  different  phases 
or  problems  of  American  political  life,  the  attempt  has 

v 

238827 


Vi  PEEFACE 

been  not  to  present  particular  problems  in  a  technical  or 
unrelated  fashion,  but  rather  to  refer  the  problem  in  every 
case  to  its  origin  in  the  struggle  for  the  achievement  of 
a  great  nationality,  and  to  show  how  the  problem  relates 
itself  to  the  continuous  evolution  of  our  free,  democratic 
society.  It  is  in  this  spirit  that  the  reader  will  find  some 
discussion  of  the  passing  problems  of  sectionalism  and 
unity;  of  immigration,  race,  and  citizenship;  of  domain 
and  the  public  guardianship  of  natural  resources;  of 
parties  and  participation  in  the  business  of  government ; 
of  economic  policies  such  as  those  relating  to  railroads, 
money,  and  the  tariff;  and,  finally,  the  questions  that 
have  arisen  in  the  nation's  dealing  with  other  governments 
and  peoples. 

Some  readers  may  find  in  the  book  a  measure  of  hopeful 
confidence  in  the  character  and  the  future  of  American 
democracy  that  current  facts  might  seem  to  them  not  to 
warrant.  It  remains,  therefore,  only  to  be  said  that  the 
views  expressed  are  mature  and  deliberate,  whether  deal- 
ing with  race  problems,  with  economic  conditions,  or  with 
the  principles  and  methods  of  our  practical  democratic 

life. 

ALBERT   SHAW. 
NEW  YORK,  1907. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTEB  PAGES 

I.    NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE. 

The  nature  and  meaning  of  politics  in  American  life ; 
national  unity  as  the  transcendent  problem      .        .  1-29 

II.    PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP. 

Constructive  problems  of  population  and  citizenship, 
with  questions  of  race,  language,  and  status     .         30-61 

III.  IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS. 

Further  remarks  upon  immigration  and  race  questions, 
with  particular  reference  to  the  Southern  problem   62-86 

IV.  SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN. 

Problems  relating  to  the  settlement  and  use  of  the 
national  domain 87-115 

V.    THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS. 

Problems  of  the  franchise,  practical  participation  in 
politics,  and  the  working  of  parties  .        .         .      116-144 


VI. 


PARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION. 
Further  problems  relating  to  party  machinery  and  the 
freedom  of  democratic  expression      .         .         .      145-165 

VII.    CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS. 

Problems  of  economic  regulation,  especially  those  re- 
lating to  railways  and  to  industrial  monopolies      166-193 

.VIII.    PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY. 

The  tariff,  questions   of  taxation,   and  problems  of 
money  and  currency  in  our  politics  .         .         .      194-223 

IX.    PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION. 

Problems  of  foreign  policy,  international  relationship, 
and  extension  of  sovereignty     ....     224-251 

INDEX 253 


POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF 
AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 


THE  NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  POLITICS  IN  AMERICAN  LIFE  J 
—  NATIONAL   UNITY   AS   THE   TRANSCENDENT  PROBLEM 

IT  is  obvious  that  there  are  two  standpoints  from  which 
to  make  a  survey  of  the  political  life  and  problems  of  a 
nation.  The  first  is  that  afforded  by  the  formal  struc- 
ture and  organization  of  government.  It  brings  into- 
focus  the  official  methods  through  which  the  political 
interests  of  the  people  find  expression.  This  mode  of 
approach  may  be  said  in  a  general  way  to  seek  answers  to 
the  question,  How  we  are  governed;  or,  more  precisely, 
the  question,  How  we  order  those  phases  of  our  associated 
life  which  in  the  broad  sense  of  the  word  we  term  political. 

The  other  standpoint  is  a  very  different  one,  although  it 
affords  an  examination  of  many  of  the  same  facts  and 
conditions.  This  second  attitude  is  that  of  practical  poli- 
tics in  its  scope,  its  motives,  its  more  definite  objects, 
and  its  relationships  to  various  social  and  economic  groups, 
and  to  human  activities  in  general.  If  the  one  method 
deals  primarily  with  the  legal  and  constitutional  aspects 
of  governmental  or  political  life,  the  other  method  deals  by 


2    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

preference  with  the  functions  of  government,  with  the 
content  of  the  political  life,  with  the  interests  and  activi- 
ties which  constitute  our  political  society. 

Doubtless  it  is  in  keeping  with  the  more  usual  order  of 
presentation  to  begin  with  the  legal  structure  and  mechan- 
ism of  government,  and  to  proceed  afterward  to  a  discussion 
of  the  functions  and  business,  the  work  and  conditions, 
of  the  political  life.  But  I  am  to  deal  with  the  concrete 
problems  that  confront  us  in  our  associated  life  as  mem- 
bers of  the  body  politic,  rather  than  with  government  in 
the  forms  through  which  it  exercises  its  power. 

Some  of  these  questions  lie  at  the  root  of  the  differ- 
ences that  give  a  certain  permanence  to  the  dividing  lines 
between  great  parties.  There  are  other  questions,  belonging 
just  as  truly  and  importantly  to  the  political  life,  that  do 
not  of  necessity  present  themselves  in  such  a  way  as  to 
coincide  with  the  lines  of  party  cleavage.  I  shall,  indeed, 
bring  forward  a  number  of  topics  and  questions  of  current 
politics.  But  it  will  be  in  accordance  with  my  purpose  to 
treat  of  them  as  illustrating  the  character  and  course  of 
our  political  life  and  progress  in  general,  rather  than  to  pre- 
sent them  as  detached  questions  for  detailed  and  unrelated 
treatment.  Thus  if  I  speak  in  subsequent  pages  of  the 
tariff  or  the  currency,  the  race  problem  or  the  public  con- 
trol of  railroads,  I  shall  deal  with  those  matters  in  their 
broader  phases  as  relating  to  the  political  development  of 
the  people  of  the  United  States. 

So  vast,  indeed,  are  the  considerations  which  react  upon 
the  political  life  in  our  times,  that  unless  one  chooses  for 
his  theme  some  specialized  topic,  he  might  almost  feel  him- 
self launched  upon  a  shoreless  sea  of  more  or  less  contro- 
verted ideas,  without  chart  or  compass.  Let  me  say  then 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE      3 

at  the  outset  that  it  is  directly  across  this  vast  and  some- 
what turbulent  sea  that  I  propose  to  sail,  and  I  hope  it 
may  be  possible  to  keep  a  fairly  consistent  course. 

It  is  not  only  stimulating,  but,  I  think,  highly  valuable, 
for  the  student  and  the  man  or  woman  of  reflective  mind  to 
read  now  and  then  some  great  book  dealing  with  the  theory 
or  the  history  and  policy  of  states.  Aristotle  and  Plato 
will  not,  indeed,  tell  us  how  to  proceed  in  precise  practical 
situations,  but  we  should  doubtless  go  forward  more  wisely 
with  our  practical  solutions  of  current  problems  if  our 
politicians  and  our  journalists  would  but  give  themselves 
that  broadening  of  mind  which  the  philosophical  study  of 
politics  would  help  to  bring  about.  It  is  really  necessary 
to  drink,  sometimes,  at  the  old  fountains.  What  the  state 
means,  or  what  it  is  for,  is  by  no  means  a  settled  question. 
It  always  recurs.  In  some  sense  it  may  be  said  to  consti- 
tute at  once  the  deepest  and  the  most  practical  of  all  our 
current  political  questions.  I  shall  not  venture  far  into 
the  metaphysics  of  the  state.  Yet,  in  order  to  proceed 
with  firmness  and  conviction  to  the  treatment  of  the 
concrete  questions  of  the  day,  it  is  almost  indispensable  to 
have  given  some  thought  —  each  intelligent  citizen  for 
himself  —  to  the  question  what  the  state,  the  government, 
the  political  life,  really  mean  and  stand  for  in  our  accepted 
scheme  of  modern  civilization. 

Some  thinkers  and  students,  from  the  very  nature  and 
constitution  of  their  minds,  are  impelled  to  find  their 
answer  to  these  questions  by  the  use  of  abstract  thinking, 
by  philosophy  and  by  logic.  Other  students  and  thinkers 
advance  by  preference  upon  historical  lines.  They  study 
the  political  history  and  development  of  mankind  at  large, 
and  of  racial  or  geographical  divisions  considered  separately. 


4        POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

However  one  proceeds,  and  whatever  theoretical  convic- 
tions he  may  derive  from  his  intellectual  processes,  he  arrives 
at  the  established  fact  that  he  must  deal  for  better  or  for 
worse  with  a  controlling  organization  of  human  society 
known  as  the  state. 

If  it  suit  the  quality  of  his  mind  to  think  in  generalities, 
as  Rousseau  and  his  French  contemporaries  thought,  or  as 
our  own  great  doctrinaire  Jefferson  found  it  natural  to 
think  (in  such  terms  and  phrases  as  one  finds  in  the  Declara- 
tion of  Independence),  I  can  see  no  serious  objection.  It 
is  quite  permissible  to  arrive  by  that  sort  of  mental  pro- 
cess at  one's  general  conception  of  the  meaning  and  place 
of  the  state,  or  of  political  government,  in  relation  to 
society. 

Or,  if  one  choose  to  follow  the  evolutionary  thinking  of  a 
Bagehot,  as  expressed  in  his  book  called  "  Physics  and 
Politics,"  or  to  adopt  the  historico-political  notions  of 
writers  like  Sir  Henry  Maine  or  Edward  A.  Freeman,  these 
surely  are  salutary  processes.  However  accurate  such 
writers  may  be  in  their  finding  in  the  modern  state  an 
aggregation  (and  an  evolution  of  the  continuous  life)  of 
ancient  village  communities,  —  their  mode  of  study  stimu- 
lates the  imagination.  They  help  the  student  to  arrive 
at  his  own  mature  conception  of  the  modern  state  and  its 
sovereignty,  especially  in  its  relation  to  its  federated  parts 
and  to  its  subdivisions,  down  to  the  primary  local  units. 

A  somewhat  different  mode  of  general  approach  is  to  be 
found  in  the  classifications  of  the  sociologist,  who  studies 
mankind  in  all  stages  of  development  and  forms  of  rela- 
tionship, and  defines  the  position  and  the  meaning  of  politi- 
cal life  in  the  complex  organic  structure  of  society.  It  is 
to  be  remembered,  further,  that  most  of  our  abstract  ideas 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE      5 

and  the  greater  part  of  our  body  of  accepted  conviction 
have  come  to  us  down  the  highway  of  Christian  theology. 
That  deep  sense  of  personal  right  and  personal  responsibility 
that  forms  the  practical  side  of  the  abstract  doctrine  of 
individualism  has  grown  up  through  religious  association 
and  tradition.  Thus  it  is  quite  possible  to  argue  that  the 
elements  of  modern  political  society  might  better  be  under- 
stood from  a  study  of  the  history  of  theology  and  of  the 
church  than  from  a  study  of  the  history  of  Aryan  villages 
and  Saxon  townships. 

Whatever  lines  of  thinking  and  of  inquiry  we  may  follow, 
however,  we  arrive  in  this  early  part  of  the  twentieth  cen- 
tury at  a  point  where  we  find,  as  a  central  edifice,  a  com-* 
plicated  human  structure  that  we  call  political.    And  we  „, 
find  a  great  mass  of  ideas,  convictions,  prejudices,  interests,  - 
and  forces  actively  at  work  in  this  political  edifice,  with  the  - 
more  or  less  conscious  and  definite  purpose  of  obtaining  - 
results  that  will  make  human  life  happier  and  better.    In  - 
political  philosophy,  the  accepted  doctrines  that  dominate 
all  things  are  those,  first,  of  individual  liberty,  and,  second, 
of  equality  of  rights  and  opportunities.     Under  these  doc- 
trines as  applied  in  political  life  and  action,  the  practical 
question  always  is,  How  to  secure  for  the  greatest  number- 
of  people  the  greatest  amount  of  freedom,  in  ways  that  do 
not  violate  the  prevailing  ideals. 

By  every  mode  of  approach,  whether  philosophical,  theo- 
logical, or  historical,  one  arrives  at  the  notions  of  political 
power  and  energy.  It  does  not  matter  for  our  purposes 
whence  this  power  is  derived.  Call  it,  if  you  will,  a  sur- 
render by  the  individual  of  a  part  of  his  theoretical  liberty, 
for  the  sake  of  a  compensating  sort  of  benefit  he  may  derive 
from  the  negative  and  positive  work  of  organized  society. 


6        POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Or  consider,  if  it  seem  a  better  theory,  that  political  power 
begins  with  an  original  status  of  absolutism,  from  which 
individual  freedom  is  derived  by  reluctant  grants  and 
gradual  extensions.  All  the  conflicting  doctrines  have 
their  phase  of  truth.  And  this  may  be  asserted  as  re- 
gards the  practical  political  life,  quite  as  truly  as  in  respect 
of  the  theoretical  approach  to  political  doctrine. 

For  we  are  made  aware,  in  a  hundred  ways,  of  the  abso- 
lutism of  the  political  power  that  is  now  over  us.  Yet  we 
are  equally  conscious  of  an  exercise  of  individual  freedom, 
by  virtue  of  which  we  voluntarily  submit  to  new  exercises 
of  political  authority  in  restraint  of  our  actions.  And 
again,  we  impose  our  free  will,  so  as  to  cause  the  state  to 
lift  its  restraining  hand  and  give  us  back  a  former  liberty 
to  move  in  other  directions.  The  fact  is  that  we  find  the 
state  a  great  "going  concern."  It  rests  upon  innumerable 
compromises,  ever  in  process  of  readjustment.  We  shape 
it  in  so  far  as  we  can  to  an  exercise  of  power  in  accordance 
with  our  opinions  and  supposed  interests.  On  the  other 
hand,  its  great  balance  wheels  revolve  with  such  momentum 
and  with  such  dynamic  energy  behind  them  as  to  equalize 
the  minor  factors  of  disturbance.  It  is  thus  that  the  state 
adds  the  valuable  elements  of  time,  method,  and  steadiness 
to  the  inevitable  process  of  change. 

In  the  present-day  political  structure  the  foremost  fact 
is  the  state,  as  represented  by  the  central,  or  national, 
government.  In  the  political  life,  as  distinguished  from 
the  structure,  on  the  other  hand,  the  foremost  fact  is  the 
citizen  himself.  The  state  is  occupied  with  the  great  ques- 
tions and  policies  that  concern  its  external  affairs;  that  is 
to  say,  its  relationship  with  other  states.  It  is  further 
concerned  with  the  ways  and  means  of  its  own  mainte- 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE      7 

nance,  and  with  the  problems  and  policies  imposed  upon  it 
by  the  conditions  of  the  country  over  which  its  sovereignty 
extends.  There  are  great  problems  that  relate  to  the 
condition  and  progress  of  the  population  as  such.  There 
are  others  which  have  to  do  with  the  conserving  and  de- 
velopment of  the  existing  national  domain  or  with  the 
extension  of  the  country's  territory.  There  are  questions 
having  to  do  with  the  intensifying  of  the  functions  and 
activities  of  the  state  by  reason  of  the  growth  of  population, 
the  shifting  of  population  groups  and  centers,  the  growth 
of  commerce  and  communication,  and  the  general  progress 
in  arts  of  civilized  life. 

It  is  the  accepted  axiom  that  the  government  must  be 
conducted  in  accordance  with  principles  of  justice.  And 
changing  social  conditions  require  almost  constant  changes 
in  the  policy  and  method  of  government,  in  order  that 
justice  may  in  reality  prevail  among  men  in  those  matters 
where  the  authority  of  government  must  intervene.  Again, 
as  human  society  grows  more  complex,  the  instrumen- 
talities of  government  must  become  more  specialized  and 
precise ;  so  that  modern  government  is  concerned  with  the 
perfecting  of  its  own  working  machinery,  as  one  of  its 
greatest  tasks. 

Furthermore,  government  has  always  to  concern  itself 
with  the  delegation  or  distribution  of  governing  power. 
Modern  statecraft  has  found  everywhere  that  the  effective- 
ness of  political  life  requires  either  a  system  of  federated 
subdivisions  like  our  states,  or  else  a  series  of  departments 
or  provinces  like  those  of  continental  Europe;  while  for 
purposes  still  more  local  in  their  political  and  administra- 
tive character  there  must  be  further  subdivisions,  corre- 
sponding to  counties,  to  townships  or  communes  or  parishes, 


8        POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

and  finally  to  municipal  and  village  organizations  for  the 
regulation  of  the  affairs  of  those  living  close  together  in 
organic  communities.  The  adjustments  of  power  and  the 
distribution  of  administrative  work  throughout  these  ter- 
ritorial and  political  subdivisions  require  constant  attention, 
and  involve  frequent  change  through  the  creation  of  new 
conditions  or  else  through  mistaken  experiments. 

The  work  of  the  state  in  relation  to  the  non-political 
groupings  or  activities  of  its  citizens  must  vary  from  time 
to  time  in  accordance  with  the  changing  importance  or 
intensity  of  such  activities.  In  one  country  or  in  one 
period,  the  state  may  seem  to  occupy  itself  above  all 
things  with  a  question  like  the  relationship  of  the  political 
society  to  the  freedom  or  the  forms  of  religious  worship ;  or 
to  the  conflicting  claims  of  state  and  church  as  regards  the 
control  of  elementary  education.  Such  questions  we  find 
just  now  deeply  occupying  the  political  life  and  thought  of 
England,  France,  Italy,  Spain,  and  other  countries.  Other 
states  find  themselves  perplexed  with  problems  growing 
out  of  a  lack  of  tribal  or  racial  unity  throughout  their 
domains ;  and  their  very  existence  is  staked  upon  the  success 
of  a  public  policy  and  a  statesmanship  intended  to  modify 
the  clashings  of  diverse  population  elements. 

Differences  of  language  or  of  religion  or  of  historic  back- 
ground are  accountable  for  many  of  those  frictions  that 
play  so  large  a  part  in  the  higher  politics  of  modern  states. 
Illustrations  will  readily  occur  of  themselves.  Thus  the 
question  of  the  government  of  Ireland  has  been  among  the 
first,  if  not  the  very  first,  of  those  that  have  perplexed  British 
statesmen  for  many  generations.  The  bond  of  language 
is  one  that  unites  bodies  of  people  in  such  firm  groupings 
that  it  is  obviously  advantageous  when  such  bodies,  of 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE      9 


kindred  blood  and  common  tongue,  coincide  with  the  higher 
political  organization  and  domain.  Where  the  state  in- 
cludes several  or  many  elements,  of  diverse  languages  and 
dissimilar  ethnic  traits,  the  work  of  the  higher  government 
becomes  very  difficult,  and  those  innumerable  concessions 
and  compromises  that  belong  to  the  state  as  a  "  going  con- 
cern" are  in  constant  process  of  disturbance,  discussion, 
and  readjustment.  The  dual  monarchy  of  Austria-Hun- 
gary furnishes  a  perpetual  example  of  difficulties  of  this 
sort,  where  the  present  task  of  statesmanship  is  to  hold  the 
discordant  parts  together  by  the  maintenance  of  unity  in 
a  few  things  at  the  expense  of  a  harmful  diversity  in  many 
other  things. 

Still  other  states  —  most  of  the  older  ones,  in  fact  — 
have  to  concern  themselves  with  those  changes  of  political 
and  social  structure  that  are  demanded  in  order  to  give 
outward  expression  to  the  modern  democratic  ideals.  This, 
practically,  is  what  politics  has  meant  in  several  countries 
for  a  century  or  more.  In  England,  as  throughout  Europe 
at  large,  it  has  for  a  long  time  been  one  of  the  principal 
tasks  forced  upon  government  to  broaden  the  political 
fabric  at  its  base.  The  new  diffusion  of  education  and  the 
gradual  breaking  down  of  social  caste  and  economic  serf- 
dom have  made  it  necessary  to  admit  more  and  more 
people  to  full  political  franchise.  In  Russia  the  process 
is  at  some  such  stage  now  as  it  had  reached  in  the  days  of 
King  John  in  England,  while  in  England  itself  the  process 
must  go  on  until  the  hereditary  House  of  Lords  disap- 
pears from  the  constitutional  organization,  and  the 
church  and  land  systems  are  reformed  to  meet  demo- 
cratic standards. 

In  some  countries,  the  business  of  the  higher  statesman- 


10     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

ship  is  in  our  times  concerned  above  all  else  with  the  regu- 
lation and  promotion  of  the  activities  of  the  citizens  in 
their  economic  relationships.  Even  where  the  struggle  for 
full  democratic  expression,  or  for  the  complete  sweeping 
away  of  surviving  feudal  privileges,  is  an  ever  present  and 
dominant  fact  in  the  political  life,  —  as  in  Germany,  for 
example,  —  the  state  may  be  found  alert  and  modern  in 
its  recognition  of  the  progress  of  the  economic  life  of  the 
people,  and  may  attach  the  utmost  seriousness  to  the  func- 
tions of  economic  oversight  and  promotion.  There  are 
some  countries  where  the  democratic  ideals  have  been  so 
fully  realized,  in  the  development  of  an  equally  advantaged 
citizenship,  that  government  not  only  seems  to  exist  chiefly 
for  the  furthering  of  the  economic  interests  and  well-being 
of  the  people,  but  shows  a  tendency  to  absorb  certain  basi- 
nesa  functions,  and  to  move  in  the  direction  of  so-called 
socialistic  undertakings. 

Examples  of  such  a  tendency  are  afforded  by  Switzer- 
land, New  Zealand,  and  Australia.  Experience  shows  that 
the  seeming  existence  of  a  tendency  of  this  sort  does  not 
necessarily  signify  the  approach  of  far-reaching  or  essential 
changes  in  the  business  of  government.  Conservatism  is 
always  at  hand  to  apply  the  brake  when  radicalism  moves 
too  fast.  I  think  it  well  to  linger  for  a  moment  or  two  upon 
this  reflection,  since  —  in  the  course  of  the  chapters  that 
are  to  follow  —  I  shall  of  necessity  make  allusion  to  a  great 
many  different  topics  of  concrete  political  activity.  I 
would,  then,  suggest  that  we  should  be  very  slow  to  arrive 
at  the  conclusion  that  a  multiplication  of  the  specialized 
and  detailed  activities  of  government  indicates  a  profound 
change  in  the  nature  or  relative  significance  of  the  state. 

The  old  balance  between  the  power  of  the  state  and  the 


. 

free  ra 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE    11 


free  range  of  individual  action  is  not  shifting  in  any  very 
perceptible  manner.  There  is  the  constant  "give  and 
take,"  as  experience  points  the  way.  In  the  stricter  regu- 
lation of  the  national  highways  of  commerce,  for  example, 
the  state  adds  with  one  hand  far  more  to  individual  initia- 
tive and  freedom  in  economic  life,  than  it  takes  away  with 
the  other  hand.  In  removing  children  from  factories  and 
sending  them  to  school,  the  state  does  not  necessarily 
exhibit  a  tendency  toward  socialistic  exercise  of  power. 
Rather  it  shows  in  effect  its  determination  to  build  up  a 
democracy  capable  of  maintaining  economic  freedom  and 
personal  initiative.  When  governmental  authority  extends 
quarantines,  regulates  and  controls  the  water  supply  under 
the  test  of  the  bacteriologist,  or  asserts  its  power  in  many 
other  new  directions,  it  does  not  follow  that  the  domain  of 
individual  freedom  is  narrowed.  On  the  contrary,  indi- 
vidual liberties  are  enhanced  when  the  family  is  protected 
against  infectious  disease,  or  unwholesome  milk,  or  adulter- 
ated food,  just  as  truly  as  is  the  individual  freedom  enhanced 
through  protection  against  invading  armies,  against  mobs 
and  riots,  against  burglars  and  highwaymen,  or  against  any 
other  sort  of  danger  to  life,  freedom  of  movement,  and  the 
pursuit  of  one's  reasonable  ends  in  life.  It  is  simply  that 
old  principles  require  new  applications  as  the  conditions  of 
life  alter  in  every  direction.  The  practical  compromises 
between  social  authority  and  private  liberty  are  changing 
in  details,  rather  than  in  essential  bearings. 

Nor  would  it  seem  to  be  true  that  there  is  any  radical 
change  coming  about  in  the  partitioning  of  lawmaking  and 
administrative  authority  between  the  higher  sovereignty 
and  the  lesser  jurisdictions.  The  greater  intensity  of 
associated  life  in  all  its  forms  is  accompanied  by  a  wider 


12      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

range  of  political  activities.  In  the  very  nature  of  the  case, 
what  we  may  call  the  federative  balance  will  adjust  itself 
according  to  convenience  and  experience,  between  the 
central  government  and  the  state  or  local  authorities. 
Those  matters  of  large  and  general  interest  which  can  best 
be  dealt  with  by  the  authority  that  has  widespread  juris- 
diction will  appropriately  devolve  upon  the  central  govern- 
ment, while  the  states  and  municipalities  will  hold  for 
themselves  —  or  draw  to  themselves  —  whatever  authority 
they  need  for  the  political  tasks  that  they  can  best  per- 
form. 

It  is  natural  that  some  men  should  be  conservative  by 
instinct  and  suspicious  of  change.  It  is  always  to  be  ex- 
pected that  many  will  cling  to  the  mere  machinery  of  gov- 
ernment and  the  established  forms  of  political  life,  as  if 
these  were  ends  in  themselves  and  things  sacred  like  the 
Ark  of  the  Covenant.  It  is  not  less  natural  that  there  should 
always  be  others  so  clear  in  their  perception  of  social  aims 
to  be  realized  through  political  action,  that  government 
seems  a  mere  means  of  getting  things  done.  To  such  minds 
the  established  political  forms  are  vexatious  obstacles  to 
progress  whenever  they  are  found  standing  in  the  way  of 
quick  achievement.  Such  reformers  have  scant  respect 
for  the  slow  processes,  and  would  change  the  machinery 
every  year.  But  here  again  one  finds  the  balance  shifting 
very  little  as  between  the  forces  of  conservatism  and  those 
of  radicalism.  By  common  agreement  there  must  be 
method  and  order  in  public  action.  And  thus  the  radical 
ground  of  to-day  is  where  the  conservatives  will  surely 
pitch  their  tents  to-morrow;  and  the  desired  reform  is 
accomplished  without  strain  or  danger. 

Meanwhile,  then,  the  state  is  not  changing  its  essential 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE    13 

character,  though  it  is  always  extending  or  modifying  the 
range  of  its  activities.  There  are  certain  great  principles 
or  tendencies,  like  the  law  of  gravitation  in  the  material 
universe,  or  the  law  of  supply  and  demand  in  the  economic 
world,  that  are  not  losing  their  validity.  The  state  is  not 
likely,  under  any  tendency  now  perceptible,  to  absorb  the 
nation's  capital  through  confiscatory  schemes  of  taxation. 
Nor  does  it  bid  fair  to  become  the  universal  landlord,  nor 
yet  the  universal  employer.  On  the  other  hand,  I  do  not 
find  any  reasonable  forecast,  based  upon  existing  tendencies, 
that  would  indicate  a  virtual  breaking  down  of  the  su- 
premacy of  the  state.  It  will  assert  itself  against  the  undue 
aggrandizement  and  power  of  productive  capital  in  the  form 
of  corporations  and  monopolies.  In  view  of  attacks  from 
the  opposite  direction,  moreover,  I  can  see  no  prospect  of 
the  weakening  of  the  authority  of  the  state  through  the 
spread  of  the  destructive  doctrines  of  the  anarchists.  The 
state  will  continue  to  dominate,  supervise,  regulate,  and 
modify,  for  the  sake  of  maintaining  a  reasonable  freedom 
of  development  in  the  economic  life,  as  in  the  other  asso- 
ciated forms  of  human  activity. 

The  state,  vthen,  is  our  highest  form  of  corporate  life. 
It  authorizes  and  regulates  other  forms  of  association,  and 
is,  in  short,  the  corporation  of  corporations,  —  the  clearing- 
house of  all  normal  forms  of  activity.  It  sanctions  and 
regulates  the  most  important  forms  of  private  relation- 
ship, namely,  those  of  the  family.  It  defines  and  protects 
personal  liberty  in  its  various  forms.  It  supports  the  in- 
stitution of  private  property,  limiting  it  according  to  the 
demands  of  the  social  welfare.  It  makes  rules  under  which 
it  administers  justice.  It  provides  for  its  own  perpetua- 
tion through  the  training  of  the  young,  the  encouragement 


14      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

of  agriculture  and  industry,  the  establishment  of  whole- 
some conditions,  whether  physical  or  moral.  It  takes  care 
that  there  shall  continue  to  be  high  standards  of  national 
life  and  character.  It  ministers  directly  to  the  advance- 
ment of  science  and  art,  and  it  fosters  the  exercise  of  public 
spirit,  philanthropy,  private  thrift  and  industry,  and  those 
virtues  without  the  existence  of  which  society  decays  and 
the  state  itself  must  disintegrate. 

The  state  is  therefore  much  more  than  a  mere  association 
of  the  individuals  who  make  up  its  citizenship,  for  coopera- 
tive objects  and  common  ends.  Other  corporate  associa- 
tions are  voluntary,  and  the  individual  may  enter  them  or 
withdraw  from  them.  He  may  renounce  his  church;  he 
may  leave  his  employment;  he  may  break  away  from  the 
parental  authority  which  under  ancient  forms  held  him  in 
patriarchal  subjection;  he  may  sacrifice  his  property.  But 
he  cannot  escape  from  his  subjection  to  the  authority  and 
power  of  the  state.  Except  for  those  rare  cases  where  the 
individual  becomes  an  outlaw  and  flees  to  the  ever  diminish- 
ing areas  in  which  conditions  of  wilderness  and  savagery 
prevail,  he  is  always  under  the  jurisdiction  of  some  govern- 
ment that  will  hold  him  amenable  to  its  rules  for  the 
ordering  of  life  and  conduct. 

Evidently  it  is  desirable  that  the  state  should  have  sta- 
bility and  that  its  organs  should  suit  the  community  over 
which  it  has  jurisdiction.  Otherwise  the  play  of  political 
forces  will  be  violent;  and  although  the  state,  under  one 
form  or  another,  will  exist  and  will  assert  its  supremacy,  its 
functions  will  be  disarranged,  and  all  the  non-political  forms 
of  social  activity  will  suffer,  because  the  political  machinery 
is  doing  its  work  badly.  It  is  an  aim  of  statesmanship  to 
maintain  good  external  relations  so  as  to  secure  international 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE     15 

justice  and  harmony,  without  incurring  the  risks  of  an 
unsuccessful  resort  to  war.  It  is  equally  its  aim  so  to 
guide  the  inner  life  of  the  nation  as  to  avoid  revolutions 
and  extreme  political  agitations. 

In  the  healthy  political  life  of  a  nation  there  will  come 
times  of  very  general  agreement,  when  opposition  to  the 
prevailing  order  of  things  is  mild  rather  than  intense,  and 
when  the  organs  of  the  state  seem,  upon  the  whole,  to  be 
working  admirably.  There  will  be  other  times  when  dif- 
ferences of  opinion  regarding  policies  and  problems  are  very 
sharp,  when  parties  become  almost  warlike  In  their  angry 
attitude  toward  each  other,  and  when  political  agitation 
seems  to  have  superseded  all  other  forms  of  expression  and 
activity.  But  with  an  intelligent  citizenship,  well  trained 
in  the  honest  use  of  the  machinery  provided  for  the  ascer- 
tainment of  the  public  will,  and  accustomed  to  the  accept- 
ance of  the  rule  of  the  majority,  no  harm  comes  to  the 
state  or  to  the  community  from  these  periods  of  political 
campaigning.  They  simply  form  a  part  of  that  necessary 
struggle  and  discipline  through  which  human  society  is 
moving,  along  the  path  of  its  destiny,  toward  a  future 
which  in  our  optimistic  philosophy  we  believe  will  some- 
how be  better  than  the  present  or  the  past  for  society  and 
for  its  individual  units. 

I  am  merely  endeavoring  to  show  that  it  is  one  of  the 
rewards  of  the  well-ordered  modern  state  that  its  machinery 
of  government  tends  to  work  with  an  increasing  smoothness 
and  strength.  The  strain  of  political  agitation  is  better 
endured  from  time  to  time.  For  the  citizen,  from  his 
standpoint,  has  been  making  the  state  a  better  thing  in 
its  practical  working ;  while  the  state,  on  its  part,  has  been 
building  up  a  better-trained  and  a  more  efficient  and  trust- 


16      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

worthy  citizenship.  A  great  part  of  the  political  life  con- 
sists in  this  action  and  reaction  between  the  citizen  and  the 
state.  It  justifies  politics  as  a  great  national  game.  The 
citizen  must  forever  be  trying  to  improve  the  character  and 
methods  of  his  government.  He  must  criticize  and  inves- 
tigate and  compare.  He  must  strive,  without  cessation  of 
effort.  The  state,  on  the  other  hand,  as  a  condition  of  its 
favorable  existence,  must  forever  be  trying  to  protect  and 
improve  the  quality  of  its  citizenship. 

Thus  the  state  must  face  an  endless  series  of  questions 
and  problems,  one  after  another,  that  concern  the  abiding 
welfare  of  the  people.  For  it  is  the  people  in  their  relations 
to  one  another,  —  their  relations  to  the  domain  they  occupy, 
to  their  families,  to  their  neighbors,  to  their  handicrafts 
or  professions,  to  their  social  habits,  to  their  intellectual 
convictions,  and  to  their  views  of  conduct,  —  that  make  up 
the  state  in  its  constituent  elements.  This  may  sound 
rather  vague  or  metaphysical,  but  it  is  true,  and  that  in  a 
most  practical  way.  For  the  state  is  not  made  up  of  the 
people  alone,  nor  yet  of  the  people  plus  the  domain,  but 
rather  of  the  people  living  in  their  accustomed  relations  to 
one  another,  pursuing  their  callings,  tilling  the  soil,  delving 
in  the  mine,  running  the  railroad,  attending  the  school, 
debating  the  problems  of  life  whether  from  the  pulpit,  or 
at  the  lunch  hour  in  the  factory,  or  at  the  corner  saloon  in 
the  evening. 

Thus  the  practical  problems  of  politics  and  of  the  state 
relate  not  to  the  people  alone,  but  to  the  people  in  associa- 
tion with  their  homes,  their  families,  their  callings,  their 
mountains,  their  rivers,  their  railroads,  their  cities,  their 
habits  of  living,  their  ways  of  thinking,  —  all  their  manifold 
interests. 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE    17 

Every  state,  considered  in  its  character  as  such  a  com- 
posite entity  as  I  have  described,  has  become  what  it  is 
largely  by  virtue  of  its  particular  history.  That  is  why  the 
more  thorough  students  of  political  development  attach  so 
much  weight  to  ethnic  considerations,  and  treat  physical 
geography  with  so  much  respect.  The  American  political 
problems  that  we  have  to  consider  could  be  understood 
very  little  if  we  gave  no  attention  to  the  racial  origins  of 
our  people,  or  to  the  physical  and  climatic  character  of  the 
great  continental  domain  over  which  our  government 
exercises  authority. 

Other  nations,  as  those  of  Europe, — in  that  complex  re- 
lationship of  the  people  to  their  domain,  their  soils,  their 
hills,  their  cities,  their  pursuits,  their  habits,  their  racial 
traditions, — are  very  much  older  than  our  own  nation. 
Their  national  life  has  deeper  root  in  the  things  of  the  past ; 
and  we  would  be  very  foolish  to  criticize  them  contemptu- 
ously because  of  certain  survivals  of  custom  and  institution 
that  are  on  their  face  condemned  by  the  logic  of  present-day 
democratic  politics.  If  in  practice  we  find  church  and 
state  a  difficult  thing  to  manage  in  the  case  of  Utah,  and  if 
we  find  the  reform  of  representation  an  almost  impossible 
thing  to  manage  in  Rhode  Island,  we  must  not  be  surprised 
at  the  difficulties  encountered  by  European  states  in  the 
modernizing  of  relationships  which  have  been  part  of  the 
web  and  woof  of  life  for  many  centuries. 

In  a  general  way  we  Americans  may  be  said  to  have 
begun  our  national  life  with  almost  entire  exemption  from 
a  set  of  political  problems  that  continues  to  disturb  the 
nations  of  Europe.  I  refer  to  those  problems  of  transition 
and  readjustment  that  have  followed  upon  the  break- 
ing up  of  feudal  life  and  medieval  conditions.  European 


18      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

political  structure  is  full  of  anomalies.  Democracy  grows 
into  actual  power,  while  retaining  monarchy  for  a  visible 
emblem  of  the  state's  dignity  and  authority,  as  well  as  of 
its  unending  continuity. 

However  fast  or  slow  the  modern  political  movement 
might  have  progressed  in  the  Renaissance  and  the  Protes- 
tant Reformation,  there  could  be  no  question  about  its 
swift  pace  when  the  modern  industrial  movement  set  in, 
with  the  application  of  steam  power  to  industry  and  trans- 
portation. The  factory  system  created  all  our  modern 
cities,  with  the  aid  of  the  railroads  and  the  steamships. 
The  industrial  nations  began  to  develop  productive  capital, 
the  efficiency  of  labor  was  multiplied,  populations  doubled 
and  quadrupled.  All  the  forms  of  new  political  activity, 
whether  in  the  broadening  of  the  political  base  and  a  change 
of  the  structure  of  government,  or  the  new  direction  of 
government  activities,  followed  inevitably  in  the  wake  of 
the  new  economic  life  based  upon  that  modern  combination 
that  we  call  capital  and  labor. 

The  logic  of  the  new  economic  system  meant  simply  the 
increase  of  labor  efficiency,  the  abundance  and  distribu- 
tion of  commodities  that  had  once  been  scarce,  the  steady 
increase  in  the  average  standard  of  living,  the  shortening 
of  the  needful  hours  of  labor,  and  the  gradual  bringing 
about  of  a  condition  where  poverty  —  which  had  previ- 
ously been  universal,  except  for  the  favored  few  —  was 
becoming  exceptional,  save  for  the  survival  of  a  degener- 
ate element  in  the  slums  of  a  few  cities.  This  new  indus- 
trial society  was  sure  to  bring  about  a  new  political  order 
of  things.  But  we  in  America  have  not  had  to  undo  an  old 
order,  while  entering  upon  a  new  one. 

The  long  unceasing  fight  for  manhood  suffrage  and  general 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE     19 

equality  of  citizenship  that  is  still  going  on  in  European 
countries  has  not  vexed  us  here,  because  such  minor  limita- 
tions as  existed  in  our  earlier  period  were  not  difficult  to 
remove  and  did  not  seriously  impair  the  prevailing  rule  of 
an  equal  democracy.  Our  colonies  had  a  common  lan- 
guage, and  with  many  diversities  of  minor  organization, 
they  had  a  fairly  homogeneous  citizenship.  They  were 
imbued  with  similar  fundamental  notions  about  the  rights 
and  duties  of  the  individual,  the  nature  of  the  democratic 
government,  —  including  parliamentary  or  representative 
institutions,  —  and  the  separation  of  lawmaking,  execu- 
tive, and  judiciary  functions. 

In  the  theory  of  international  law  and  in  the  practice  of 
diplomacy,  the  planet  upon  which  we  live  is  geographically 
partitioned  among  a  series  of  equal,  sovereign,  independent 
states.  For  purposes  of  intercourse  between  nations,  this 
is  a  useful  working  theory,  although  it  corresponds  to  the 
real  facts  only  in  a  limited  and  superficial  way.  Small 
states  hold  their  position  in  the  series  of  sovereignties  by 
virtue  of  the  protection  of  some  large  state,  or  through  the 
guarantee  of  a  group  of  states.  Other  sovereignties,  which 
are  complete  for  domestic  purposes,  are  in  greater  or  less 
degree  subject  in  the  international  sense  to  the  overlord- 
ship  of  some  greater  imperial  sovereignty. 

Thus  the  current  theory  of  a  series  of  equal  and  inde- 
pendent states,  which  has  served  a  useful  purpose  for  a  long 
time  past,  is  one  that  had  its  well-known  historical  begin- 
nings in  the  rise  of  modern  European  nations  after  the 
break-up  of  medieval  imperialism;  and  it  is  a  theory  that 
may  gradually  disappear  as  world  relationships  take  on 
new  forms.  This  observation  is  quite  germane  to  my 
general  theme,  because  several  of  our  most  practical  and 


20      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

most  controverted  problems  in  current  American  politics 
are,  in  point  of  fact,  related  to  this  possibly  altered  theory 
of  sovereignty  from  the  international  standpoint.  Our 
relations  to  Cuba,  to  San  Domingo,  to  Panama,  to  the 
Philippines,  and  our  attitude  toward  a  variety  of  questions 
and  topics,  are  affected  by  changing  tendencies  in  world 
politics  and  international  relations. 

How  rapidly,  it  may  be  asked,  are  we  moving  toward 
a  new  period  of  world  harmony  through  the  gradually 
strengthening  bonds  of  commercial  treaties,  postal  unions, 
periodic  conferences  like  the  one  lately  held  at  Rio,  special 
conferences  like  that  held  at  Algeciras,  lawgiving  assem- 
blages, like  the  first  Hague  Congress,  and  courts  for  the 
adjustment  of  differences,  like  the  permanent  Hague 
Tribunal?  In  abstract  theory,  the  citizen  yields  some  of 
his  freedom  to  the  community  for  the  sake  of  the  greater 
practical  freedom  that  comes  to  him  from  its  protection  and 
its  positive  services.  In  some  analogous  way,  the  minor 
sovereignty  of  state,  or  province,  or  dukedom,  or  prin- 
cipality may  be  regarded  as  parting  with  something  of 
its  independence  and  authority,  when  it  enters  the  larger 
state  under  which  it  obtains  security  and  prosperity  for  its 
non-political  interests.  Is  it  not  further  possible  that  the 
great  states  of  the  present  order,  —  each  trailing  behind 
it  a  family  of  minor  states  or  of  colonies  and  dependen- 
cies, —  may  agree  to  yield  up  a  portion  of  their  theoretical 
sovereignty  and  absolutism  to  a  higher  international  juris- 
diction, for  the  sake  of  peace  and  harmony,  and  for  the 
safeguarding  of  those  non-political  interests  of  commerce 
and  of  human  brotherhood  that  hate  the  risks  of  war,  and 
that  find  something  rather  arbitrary  and  narrow  in  the 
present  conception  and  practice  of  nationalism? 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE     21 

However  that  may  be,  the  process  is  not  to  be  hurried. 
Limited  federation  rather  than  sweeping  assimilation  is  the 
principle  that  our  more  recent  experience  would  tend  to 
establish.  As  I  have  said,  we  began  in  our  American  re- 
public without  kings,  without  great  landed  aristocracies, 
without  powerful  ecclesiastical  establishments,  without  in- 
trenched privilege  in  any  form.  These  are  the  matters  that 
have  given  other  lands  a  century  or  two  centuries  of  politi- 
cal problems,  of  logical  division  between  liberalism  and 
conservatism,  and  of  struggles  to  realize  equality  of  citi- 
zenship and  an  even  distribution  of  right  and  power 
throughout  the  body  politic. 

Our  early  settlers  had  been  made  up  largely  from  those 
advance  forces  of  reform  in  church  and  state  —  chiefly 
in  England,  but  also  in  other  European  countries  —  the 
outworking  of  whose  ideas  has  largely  determined  the 
subsequent  course  of  political  controversy  and  develop- 
ment in  their  original  home  countries  for  the  past  three 
centuries.  Even  if  adherents  of  the  old  order  had  in  the 
main  made  up  the  early  American  colonial  groups,  the 
conditions  of  life  in  the  new  country  would  perforce  have 
modernized  their  views  and  made  democrats  of  them. 
But  since  the  American  settlers  were  for  the  most  part 
already  in  revolt  against  the  old  order,  with  convictions 
so  strong  that  they  were  willing  to  sacrifice  almost  every- 
thing for  freedom  of  thought  and  action,  it  was  the  more 
certain  that  when  the  new  communities  they  were  creating 
in  the  wilderness  had  come  together,  —  and  had  finally 
swung  out  into  their  orbit  as  a  complete  and  independent 
state  in  the  international  sense,  —  the  democratic  and 
republican  basis  of  that  state  should  have  been  secure  and 
unquestioned. 


22     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Thus,  to  repeat,  most  of  the  things  which  have  divided 
parties  and  been  the  subject-matter  of  political  life  and 
action  in  modern  European  countries  were  matters  of 
unanimous  agreement  with  us  from  the  very  outset.  Our 
larger  political  life  has  not,  therefore,  been  so  logical  or  con- 
sistent in  its  course  and  progress.  The  stranger  who  would 
study  our  constitutional  and  political  history  would  not 
find  it  following  the  analogies  afforded  by  the  history  of 
England  or  of  other  European  countries. 

Our  geographical  separation  from  Europe  has  from  the 
beginning  strengthened  us  in  our  international  position. 
Our  flag  has  always  floated  everywhere  as  the  emblem  of 
an  unquestioned  political  entity  and  sovereignty.  And 
our  internal  contentions  and  struggles  have  been  far  less 
dangerous  to  our  stability  than  they  would  have  been  had 
we  lived  in  contiguity  to  other  powerful  states.  It  so  hap- 
pened that  the  distance  of  the  other  great  members  of  our 
world  system  of  sovereignties  lessened  relatively  the  cen- 
trifugal forces.  Our  isolation  contributed  to  the  con- 
ditions which  in  spite  of  ourselves  have  kept  us  from  flying 
to  pieces. 

The  elements  that  make  up  a  state,  as  I  have  said,  do 
not  consist  alone  in  its  people,  in  its  territory,  nor  in  its 
legal  instruments  and  forms.  They  are  to  be  found  in  the 
blending  of  all  its  interests,  material  or  otherwise.  The 
Declaration  of  Independence,  the  Revolutionary  War,  the 
experience  of  the  colonies  under  the  Articles  of  Confed- 
eration, and,  in  due  course,  the  adoption  of  the  present 
Constitution  of  1787,  all  played  their  indispensable  part 
in  the  founding  of  a  great  sovereignty. 

But  the  internal  character  of  our  sovereign  state,  and 
its  permanence  in  the  world  of  states,  had  yet  to  be  worked 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE     23 

out.  This  became  the  central  problem  of  our  political  life 
until  some  forty  years  ago.  And  while  that  central  problem 
seems  now  to  have  been  settled  for  a  good  while  to  come, 
many  echoes  are  still  heard  from  the  noise  and  clash  of  the 
old-time  controversy.  Thus  a  number  of  our  discussions 
of  current  politics  can  only  be  understood  in  the  light  of 
the  great  dispute  that  had  to  be  settled  by  force  upon  the 
field  of  battle.  The  unity  and  strength  of  states  require 
such  a  blending  of  interests  that  the  considerations  which 
hold  their  parts  together  are  much  stronger  than  the  con- 
siderations which  would  pull  them  apart.  It  is  neither 
useful  nor  scientific,  therefore,  in  the  study  of  deep-lying 
political  controversies,  like  our  own  long  contest,  to  attach 
too  great  importance  to  the  question  which  side  was  right 
and  which  side  was  wrong.  Statesmanship  is  a  matter  of 
compromise  and  expediency.  The  difference  between  right 
and  wrong  in  public  policies  is  not  so  much  a  matter  of 
abstract  ethics  as  it  is  a  matter  of  the  Gregorian  calendar. 
It  is  not  so  much  what  should  be  done  in  politics  as  how  to 
do  it,  and,  above  all,  when  to  do  it. 

Nearly  all  the  differences  between  conservative  groups 
and  liberal  groups  can  be  referred  to  that  simple  question 
of  dates.  Russia  shall  have  constitutional  liberties  and 
parliamentary  institutions:  certainly,  every  one  agrees 
to  that.  But  the  disputed  question  is,  when  and  by  what 
process  and  after  what  course  of  preliminaries.  Are 
separation  and  revolution  justifiable  in  given  cases,  and 
how  shall  they  be  avoided?  We  were  facing  those  ques- 
tions in  our  practical  political  life  for  more  than  seventy 
years.  Now,  such  questions  as  separation  and  revolution 
do  not  enter  into  the  serious  stages  of  political  controversy 
without  deep-lying  causes.  There  is  usually  a  strong  argu- 


24     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

ment  on  both  sides.  There  may  be  lacking  a  citizenship 
fit  for  responsible  and  regulated  political  life.  There  may 
be  a  governmental  machinery  so  ill  devised  that  it  is  not 
responsive  to  the  needs  of  the  body  politic,  or  elastic  in  its 
bearing  upon  the  different  conditions  of  the  several  con- 
stituent parts  of  the  state.  .  Or  deep  discord  may  inhere  in 
differences  of  non-political  social  structure  and  in  the  ends 
and  aims  of  organized  life.  A  tariff  system  might  seem 
beneficial  to  one  section  and  ruinous  to  another.  In  a  well- 
ordered  state  the  normal  play  of  political  life  at  such  a 
period  would  bring  about  a  change  of  tariff  policy,  and  a 
gradual  equalizing  of  economic  conditions,  for  the  sake  of 
the  larger  interests  involved  in  the  maintenance  of  unity. 
The  continuance  of  our  federal  union  was  for  more  than 
two  generations  an  object  of  concern  so  profound  that  all 
our  important  domestic  and  foreign  policies  had  to  be 
tested  by  the  question  whether  the  play  of  party  difference 
and  controversy  would  fall  within  the  normal  lines  of 
ordinary  political  strife,  or  whether  it  would  go  deeper  and 
threaten  disruption.  New  England,  through  its  devotion 
to  commercial  and  seafaring  pursuits,  protected  the  slave 
trade  in  the  early  day,  and  plotted  secession  when  the 
second  war  with  England  was  preceded  by  embargoes  on 
shipping.  The  presence  of  so  distinct  a  race  as  the  negroes 
and  the  existence  of  so  archaic  an  institution  as  slavery 
provided  us  from  the  very  outset  with  elements  of  the  most 
serious  political  controversy.  The  rapid  development  of 
the  slave  system  in  one  half  of  the  country,  while  it  was 
excluded  from  the  other  half,  made  a  condition  fraught 
with  ever  increasing  danger  to  unity.  This  difficulty  was 
accentuated  by  the  rapid  growth  in  the  northern  half  of 
the  country  of  the  modern  industrial  system,  followed  by 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE     25 

the  creation  of  manufacturing  cities,  the  building  of  rail- 
roads, and  the  transformation  of  agricultural  into  manu- 
facturing states.  The  early  Southern  statesmen  had  hoped 
for  a  retreat  from  the  slavery  system  before  its  numerical 
and  economic  factors  made  it  unmanageable.  The  North- 
ern statesmen  had  tolerated  the  continuance  of  the  slave 
trade  through  the  pressure  of  private  commercial  interests, 
and  with  little  thought  of  the  day  of  reckoning. 

The  invention  of  the  cotton  gin  gave  the  agricultural 
South  a  new  and  stupendous  source  of  wealth  and  power, 
strengthened  the  slave  system  tenfold,  and  crystallized 
the  Southern  attitude  against  protective  tariffs  at  the  very 
moment  when  Northern  economic  tendencies  made  for  pro- 
tective duties.  National  statesmen  like  Webster  and  Clay 
saw  the  importance  of  time  as  an  element  in  political  con- 
troversy, and  sought  compromises  which  would  postpone 
projects  of  division  in  order  that  there  might  grow  up  those 
varied  and  ever  blending  interests  that  hold  nations  together 
in  spite  of  their  differences.  And  this  was  a  rational  and 
legitimate  course  of  action.  Many  a  statesman  in  many  a 
country  has  gone  so  far  as  to  seek  external  disputes  and  to 
risk  international  war,  for  the  sake  of  arousing  patriotism 
at  home  and  tiding  over  a  threatened  period  of  civil  strife 
or  territorial  division. 

The  hair-splitting  of  the  lawyers  played  its  part  and  had 
its  influence  upon  the  national  state  of  mind,  so  that  it  may 
be  said  to  have  entered  really  into  the  controversy.  But 
the  deeper  questions  at  issue  were  not  those  of  the  dialec- 
ticians or  the  constitutional  lawyers.  The  arguments  for 
and  against  the  Virginia  and  Kentucky  Resolutions  were 
excellent  on  both  sides,  and  in  later  years  the  logic  of 
Calhoun  was  as  flawless  as  the  logic  of  Webster. 


26     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

The  deep  forces  of  our  political  life  were  working  toward 
their  own  conclusions,  while  the  lawyers  were  debating  the 
nature  of  the  federal  compact.  There  had  been  thirteen 
original  colonies  laying  claim  to  the  possession  of  national 
sovereignty;  and  these  thirteen  had  delegated  certain 
powers,  by  virtue  of  which  they  had  created  a  fourteenth 
entity,  which  alone  represented  them  in  external  relations, 
and  which  alone  was  recognized  by  the  rest  of  the  world  as 
having  the  attributes  of  sovereignty.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
apart  from  theory,  not  one  of  the  thirteen  had  ever  really 
stood  out  in  possession  of  statehood  in  the  higher  sense,  or 
exercised  sovereignty  in  the  presence  of  the  world.  They 
were  in  a  condition  of  evolving  nationality,  with  no  outside 
status  except  their  collective  one,  and  with  a  very  imperfect 
adjustment  of  their  internal  structure. 

In  the  Napoleonic  epoch  and  later  on,  European  sovereign- 
ties were  frequently  lost  to  sight  and  then  appeared  again. 
Germanic  confederations  and  empires  have  been  recrystal- 
lized  in  various  forms  of  inner  and  outer  sovereignty.  It 
is  not  in  the  least  strange  or  discreditable,  therefore,  that 
these  straggling  minor  sovereignties  of  ours,  extending  all 
the  way  from  the  St.  Lawrence  River  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico, 
should  also  have  been  deeply  agitated  over  the  possibilities 
of  dissolution  and  regrouping.  It  could  not  have  been 
otherwise  under  the  circumstances. 

The  arguments  on  both  sides  were  entirely  legitimate. 
It  belonged  to  the  nationalist  or  federalist  to  hold  things 
together  until  the  complex  blend  of  advantages  in  union 
should  clearly  outweigh  the  considerations  that  lay  behind 
the  motives  of  separation.  There  lies  no  compelling  obli- 
gation in  paper  compacts.  Written  constitutions  of  federal 
character  have  final  value  only  as  they  are  sustained  by  the 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE     27 

realities  that  hold  the  several  states  or  sections  together, 
regardless  of  recent  or  ancestral  documents. 

In  our  case,  then,  what  was  the  really  determining  fac- 
tor that  settled  not  only  the  questions  of  argument,  but 
also  decided  in  advance  the  issues  of  a  needless  and  ill- 
fated  war?  The  answer  is  a  plain  one,  and  it  goes  to  the 
heart  of  all  our  political  life.  The  unity  of  the  nation  was 
not  evolved  out  of  the  arguments  or  wishes  or  even  the 
war  struggles  of  the  thirteen  original  so-called  sovereign- 
ties that  had  formed  the  compact.  For  a  new  makeweight, 
altogether,  had  appeared,  in  the  growth  of  the  nation 
beyond  the  Alleghanies.  The  chief  steps  toward  union  - 
following  the  events  that  led  up  to  the  constitutional 
arrangement  of  1787 — had  been,  first,  the  cession  of  the 
northwestern  lands  by  Virginia  and  the  other  colonies  to 
the  Union  as  a  whole,  and,  second,  the  great  Louisiana 
Purchase  accomplished  a  little  later  by  Mr.  Jefferson. 

These  vast  domains  were  unquestionably  national,  what- 
ever might  have  been  the  status  of  the  thirteen  colonies. 
And  as  the  new  states  one  by  one  came  into  the  Union,  the 
federal  compact  became  a  mere  legal  theory,  — a  piece  of 
fiction  comparable  with  that  in  accordance  with  which  the 
king  of  England  is  still  the  source  of  all  authority  and 
power.  For  whatever  may  be  true  of  the  original  thirteen, 
it  is  not  true  of  any  of  the  other  states,  excepting  Texas 
alone,  that  it  was  ever  sovereign  in  any  sense  of  the  word, 
plenary  or  limited.  These  states  are  territorial  divisions 

a  great  inseparable  national  domain,  peopled,  not  by 
Ohioans,  or  Kentuckians,  or  Nebraskans,  or  Californians, 
but  by  Americans,  owing  full  and  undivided  allegiance  to 
the  government  of  the  nation. 

During  that  very  period  when  the  constitutional  lawyers 


s 


28     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

were  debating  the  nature  of  the  federal  compact,  we  were 
creating  a  nation  that  belonged  to  itself,  that  owed  noth- 
ing to  preexisting  local  commonwealths,  and  that  found 
no  sufficient  reason  to  attach  more  importance  to  legal 
fictions  than  to  plain  historical  truth  and  to  the  normal 
forces  of  political  life.  If  divergence  of  interests  between 
North  and  South,  or  between  East  and  West,  should  in 
some  future  time  become  so  great  that  the  benefits  of 
national  union  were  in  the  minds  of  most  men  outweighed 
by  the  disadvantages,  cleavage  might  follow  and  separate 
sovereignties  might  emerge.  But  the  reasons  for  such 
division  would  no  longer  be  referred  back  to  the  legal  nature 
of  the  federal  compact. 

Our  system  as  now  established  does  not  contemplate  the 
withdrawal  of  a  state  or  a  group  of  states  by  orderly  pro- 
cess. The  Constitution  provides  a  way  for  the  admission 
of  new  states,  but  no  way  for  the  expulsion  or  withdrawal 
of  a  state  once  admitted.  Thus  in  our  newer  series  of 
political  questions  —  dealing  in  some  of  their  phases  with 
the  relations  between  the  state  and  the  nation  —  the  old 
fine-spun  arguments  about  states'  rights  and  national 
sovereignty  survive  as  historical  curiosities.  The  national 
Constitution  is  subject  to  amendment  as  are  those  of  the 
states.  The  distribution  of  functions  is  to  be  worked  out 
from  time  to  time  for  purposes  of  convenience  in  the  light 
of  experience.  With  this  practical  freedom  to  adjust  and 
to  change,  nobody  is  in  danger  of  oppression  or  harm 
through  the  aggrandizement  of  the  central  government. 
Nor,  conversely,  is  any  one  in  danger  from  the  undue  asser- 
tion of  state  supremacy. 

Political  sentiment  and  political  education  make  for  the 
broad  and  continental  view,  rather  than  for  the  narrow 


NATURE  AND  MEANING  OF  OUR  POLITICAL  LIFE     29 


and  parochial  view.  In  matters  of  wide  concern,  where 
the  federal  government  has  not  acquired  or  exercised  au- 
thority, there  is  a  tendency  toward  voluntary  unformity  in 
the  laws  and  customs  of  the  several  states.  The  civil  and 
penal  codes  of  New  York  have,  with  more  or  less  change, 
been  transferred  to  the  statute  books  of  many  another 
state.  Each  state  is  a  laboratory  of  political  experimenta- 
tion, and  its  successful  undertakings  are  widely  imitated 
in  other  states.  Thus  we  find  a  field  for  constant  discus- 
sion and  safe  controversy,  touching  the  relative  functions 
of  state  and  national  government.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
progressive  work  of  one  state  will  set  an  example  that  leads 
to  wholesome  political  controversy  within  the  real  though 
limited  field  of  state  politics,  in  the  commonwealths  that 
are  less  advanced  at  certain  points,  as  for  example  in  mat- 
ters of  education  or  taxation  or  penology,  or  in  methods  for 
the  protection  of  the  public  welfare  against  the  undue 
pressure  of  private  interests. 


II 


CONSTRUCTIVE     PROBLEMS    OF    POPULATION    AND     CITIZEN- 
SHIP, WITH  QUESTIONS  OF  RACE,  LANGUAGE,  AND  STATUS 

THERE  is  a  sense  in  which  the  molding  of  an  effective 
citizenship,  imbued  with  a  sense  of  public  as  distinguished 
from  private  well-being,  and  capable  from  time  to  time  of 
fairly  harmonious  action,  is  at  once  the  principal  task  and 
the  highest  reward  of  government.  There  is  another  sense 
in  which  the  shaping  of  an  efficient  mechanism  of  govern- 
ment is  the  chief  concern  of  a  well-ordered  citizenship. 
In  practice  the  processes  are  not  very  distinct  from  each 
other,  although  to  some  extent  they  are  separable  for 
purposes  of  discussion.  Both  processes  give  rise  to  groups 
or  successions  of  political  problems. 

The  visitor  from  another  country  finds  here  a  great  Eng- 
lish-speaking population  of  composite  European  descent. 
Its  legal  and  social  structure,  its  literature,  its  moral  and 
religious  ideas,  like  its  prevailing  language,  are  of  English 
origin.  Modifications  have  been  great  in  number  and  deep 
in  influence,  but  the  manifest  advantages  of  a  common 
language  have  been  great  enough  thus  far  to  prevail  over 
all  obstacles ;  and  language  itself  has  a  wonderful  power  to 
preserve  laws,  forms,  customs,  and  ideals. 

In  our  formative  period,  the  nations  that  were  reaching 
out  with  the  instinct  for  colonization  in  new  countries 
were  principally  the  English,  French,  Spanish,  and  Dutch. 

30 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP         31 

They  were  maritime  and  commercial  nations,  and  they  be- 
came great  naval  powers  in  the  course  of  their  commercial 
and  colonial  rivalries.  The  ultimate  character  of  North 
America  as  respects  race  and  language  could  not  have  been 
predicted  until  after  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
Few  people  realize  how  much  depends  upon  the  acquisition 
of  technical  sovereignty  over  unoccupied  territories. 

There  are  men  now  living  who  knew  in  their  childhood 
grandfathers  or  old  neighbors  who  had  survived  from  the 
period  of  the  French  and  Indian  War,  when  the  entire 
English  foothold  on  this  continent  lay  east  of  the  Appa- 
lachian Mountains,  nowhere  reaching  so  far  north  or  west 
as  the  St.  Lawrence  River,  and  extending  southward  only 
to  about  the  middle  of  what  is  now  Georgia.  It  was  a  coast- 
wise fringe  about  a  hundred  miles  deep.  Florida,  the  Gulf 
of  Mexico,  Texas,  California,  and  the  great  West  belonged 
to  Spain.  To  France  belonged  not  only  the  territories 
contiguous  to  the  St.  Lawrence  River  and  the  Great  Lakes, 
but  the  entire  country  drained  by  the  Mississippi  River  and 
its  tributaries  from  western  Pennsylvania  to  the  Rocky 
Mountains. 

Conditions  which  had  led  to  American  colonization  had 
brought  to  the  English  settlements  a  class  of  people  better 
fitted  for  agricultural  and  industrial  pioneering  and  the 
making  of  modern  communities  than  had  gone  from  Spain. 
or  France  to  the  territories  over  which  they  had  assumed 
jurisdiction.  The  Spaniards  had  in  Mexico  and  farther 
south  found  a  comparatively  large  Indian  population,  with 
cities  and  towns,  agricultural  development,  and  wealth  in 
gold  and  silver.  From  the  economic  standpoint  the 
Spaniards  were  conquerors  and  despoilers,  while  from  the 
religious  standpoint  they  were  missionaries  and  church 


32     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

builders.  They  imposed  the  Spanish  language  and  church, 
and  many  Spanish  customs,  upon  the  native  population. 
But  conditions  made  it  difficult  to  create  in  Mexico,  or 
elsewhere  in  North  America,  a  Spanish-speaking  population 
of  European  stock  and  character. 

The  French  in  the  province  of  Quebec  showed  capacity 
to  take  root  in  new  soil  and  to  develop  communities  and 
institutions;  and  they  had  begun  to  show  a  like  capacity 
in  their  settlements  on  the  extreme  lower  Mississippi.  But 
for  the  rest  of  their  great  domain  they  were  too  much 
scattered.  As  explorers,  missionaries  to  the  northern 
Indians,  fur  traders  and  trappers  along  the  vast  network 
of  interior  waterways,  they  were  a  superb  race  of  pioneers ; 
but  their  settlements  were  remote,  and  their  pursuits  were 
too  precarious  for  the  rapid  development  of  a  people. 
Nevertheless,  if  the  war  between  England  and  France  had 
ended  differently,  and  if  the  French  rather  than  the  Eng- 
lish had  won  in  the  decisive  battle  of  Quebec,  we  should 
probably  have  had  to  deal  in  North  America  with  a  very 
different  set  of  political  problems. 

The  war  that  ended  in  1763  had  carried  English  juris- 
diction to  the  Mississippi,  and  our  own  war  that  ended 
twenty  years  later  had  substituted  the  American  for  the 
English  flag.  If  the  earlier  war  had  not  been  fought,  or  if 
it  had  ended  differently,  it  is  not  probable  that  the  colonies 
would  have  sought  their  independence.  The  French  power 
would  have  increased  steadily,  as  would  also  the  French 
population  west  of  the  Alleghanies.  New  Orleans,  St.  Louis, 
Detroit,  Pittsburg,  and  various  other  communities  would 
have  taken  on  a  permanently  French  character  like  Mon- 
treal or  Quebec.  For  our  English-speaking  people  must 
not  think  that  the  French  could  not  have  developed  a  great 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       33 

nation  in  North  America  if  they  had  but  retained  sover- 
eignty over  their  unoccupied  territory  for  another  century. 

It  was  a  series  of  larger  historical  events,  having  their 
chief  causes  in  the  rivalries  and  struggles  of  Europe,  that 
preempted  a  great  domain  for  the  English-speaking  colonies 
of  the  Atlantic  seaboard  and  gave  them  an  opportunity  to 
create  a  powerful  and  homogeneous  nation  in  the  process 
of  subduing  a  wilderness.  We  acquired  our  territory  west- 
ward to  the  Mississippi  before  the  French  trading  posts  on 
the  rivers  and  lakes  had  become  important  enough  to  give 
any  permanent  character  to  the  development  of  the  country. 
In  like  manner,  some  twenty  years  after  the  close  of  the 
Revolutionary  War,  we  acquired,  through  the  so-called 
Louisiana  Purchase,  the  great  remaining  territory  of  France 
stretching  from  the  Mississippi  to  the  Rocky  Mountains, 
and  containing  few  permanent  communities  except  in  what 
is  now  Louisiana  proper.  Mexico  retained  Texas  and  the 
California  country  for  a  generation  longer,  but  developed 
it  too  slowly  to  give  it  a  permanent  Spanish  impress;  and 
it  fell  into  our  hands  while  it  was  still  for  the  most  part 
an  unpeopled  and  wilderness  region. 

If  a  nation  possesses  a  certain  degree  of  pioneering  and 
colonizing  energy,  its  natural  instinct  is  for  the  acquisition 
of  contiguous  unoccupied  territory.  Growth  of  numbers, 
wealth,  and  power  is  an  instinctive  demand  that  belongs 
to  the  sense  of  nationality,  and  is  bound  up  with  the  spirit 
of  patriotism.  An  extension  of  domain  where  circum- 
stances permit  is  one  of  the  most  obvious  elements  of  such 
national  growth.  The  acquisition  of  adjacent  undeveloped 
territory  by  an  agricultural  nation  whose  people  have  the 
pioneering  impulse  and  a  natural  hunger  for  land  owner- 
ship is  a  wholly  different  thing  from  the  extension  of 


34    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

sovereignty  over  established  communities.  Thus  our  earlier 
extensions  of  sovereignty,  for  the  sake  of  our  normal  west- 
ward development,  involved  a  set  of  political  problems 
wholly  unlike  those  that  would  attend  our  acquisition  of 
Cuba,  or  that  would  arise  in  case  of  a  proposal  to  annex 
the  older  parts  of  Canada  on  the  north  or  the  Republic  of 
Mexico  on  the  south. 

No  state  of  modern  times  has  had  such  an  opportunity 
for  the  development  of  a  homogeneous  citizenship  of  high 
character  and  capacity  as  fell  to  the  lot  of  the  United  States. 
An  early  perception  of  this  fact  became  very  general,  and 
although  its  expression  was  often  boastful  and  exagger- 
ated, it  was  of  itself  an  important  element  in  the  growth 
of  the  nation.  Never  was  there  a  nation  so  convinced  of 
its  own  high  destiny,  so  sure  of  the  peculiar  favor  of  Provi- 
dence, or  so  sincerely  sorry  for  the  inferior  lot  of  people 
born  in  other  lands  and  living  under  other  jurisdictions. 
This  superb  confidence  had  much  to  do  with  differentiat- 
ing the  American  people  from  other  peoples.  It  helped 
them  to  surmount  the  difficulties  that  lay  in  the  way  of 
their  progress,  and  it  gave  them  power  to  assimilate  new 
ingredients  of  population. 

It  would  be  a  mistake  to  regard  their  favorable  opinion 
of  their  own  political  and  social  advantages  as  a  seriously 
erroneous  one.  The  American  communities  in  our  Revo- 
lutionary period  were  the  most  advanced  in  average  condi- 
tion of  any  in  the  world.  There  was  a  higher  diffusion  of 
intelligence  and  a  more  even  distribution  of  property  than 
in  any  of  the  European  countries.  Here  was  to  be  wit- 
nessed the  one  great  democratic  experiment  of  the  modern 
world.  And  the  chief  solicitude  of  American  govern- 
ment and  statesmanship  was  for  the  preservation  of  those 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       35 

conditions  and  ideals,  which  were  so  distinctive  that  they 
gave  our  people  a  certain  consciousness  of  high  example 
and  the  sense  of  a  mission  to  inspire  liberal  and  democratic 
tendencies  in  European  countries  against  effete  institu- 
tions. 

So  real  and  so  powerful  were  these  sentiments  in  our  early 
period,  and  with  such  good  reason  when  viewed  in  the  light 
of  historical  facts  and  contrasts,  that  it  is  by  no  means 
strange  that  they  should  have  done  constant  service  in  our 
own  political  controversies.  Practical  democracy  became 
doctrinaire  and  exacting.  It  was  suspicious  of  any  sort 
of  restriction  or  limitation.  It  preferred  a  somewhat 
riotous  individual  freedom  to  a  restraint  that  might  savor 
too  much  of  centralized  authority  and  power. 

In  New  England  the  town  meeting  and  the  small  democ- 
racy of  the  self-governing  neighborhood  had  created  a 
remarkably  efficient  and  well-trained  citizenship.  The 
Southern  county  system  had  not  developed  the  private 
citizen  so  highly,  but  it  had  produced  in  every  county  a 
very  considerable  number  of  men  capable  of  leadership  and 
of  administrative  work.  After  the  Revolution  the  west- 
ward movement  advanced  with  great  energy  and  rapidity. 
The  new  lands  were  subdivided  and  sold  with  conscious 
reference  to  their  settlement  and  ownership  by  small 
farmers,  —  not  for  acquisition  and  retention  in  the  form  of 
large  estates.  The  land  system  intentionally  facilitated 
the  subsequent  formation  of  local  governments  in  town- 
ships and  counties,  of  convenient  size  and  general  regu- 
larity. The  support  of  schools  was  provided  for  by  the 
designation  for  school  purposes  of  certain  lands  in  each 
new  township. 

As    the    process    of    settlement    went    on,   Territorial 


36    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

governments  were  established,  through  which  all  the 
rudiments  of  local  political  life  were  planted  and  nurtured 
under  national  authority  and  oversight.  Thus  when  the 
new  communities  had  attained  sufficient  growth  and  sta- 
bility to  be  admitted  as  states  in  the  Union,  they  were 
already  in  possession  of  the  same  laws  and  customs  and 
local  institutions  of  self-government  as  had  grown  up  in  the 
older  states  from  which  they  had  migrated,  but  reduced 
to  a  more  regular  and  typical  form.  In  the  local  institu- 
tions of  the  newer  states  there  had  been  worked  out  certain 
types  that  blended  and  combined  the  somewhat  varying 
systems  of  the  original  seaboard  colonies.  In  the  structure 
and  government  of  the  Western  townships  and  counties 
there  was  a  combination  of  the  characteristics  of  the  New 
England  towns  and  the  Virginia  counties. 

And  while  there  was  a  certain  tendency  to  migrate  west- 
ward on  parallel  lines,  each  of  the  newer  states  received 
population  accessions  from  a  number  of  the  older  ones,  with 
the  result  that  the  westward  movement  added  constantly 
to  the  solidarity  of  the  people,  and  intensified  whatever 
was  distinctive  in  their  traits  as  Americans  and  what- 
ever was  typical  in  their  institutions.  It  is  always  to  be 
borne  in  mind  that  this  process  of  growth  and  development 
across  the  continent  was  not  by  methods  that  were  random 
or  accidental,  — or  even  natural,  in  the  sense  of  being 
unrestrained.  It  was,  upon  the  whole,  a  process  of  an 
ordered  sort,  guided  by  a  national  policy  that  was  concern- 
ing itself  as  regards  the  permanent  character  of  American 
citizenship.  The  thing  aimed  at  was  fitness  to  maintain 
through  future  generations  the  democratic  political  life  of 
the  country  whether  local  or  national. 

This   process  of  creating  a  continental   people,  demo- 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP        37 

cratic  in  spirit  and  republican  in  political  forms,  has  been 
one  of  the  great  positive  aims  of  government  in  the  United 
States,  and  many  practical  questions  and  problems  have 
from  time  to  time  arisen  in  association  with  it.  Economic 
and  social  conditions  in  the  early  period  of  the  country  were 
favorable  to  large  families,  and  the  westward  movement 
was  strong  and  irresistible.  Since  the  church,  the  school, 
and  the  local  organization  of  government  were  promptly 
established  as  each  new  county  or  township  of  the  public 
domain  was  surveyed  and  opened  to  settlement,  the  free- 
dom and  private  initiative  of  frontier  life  were  tempered 
by  the  presence  of  familiar  institutions. 

The  process  was  so  rapid  that  the  country  had  been  set- 
tled from  one  ocean  to  the  other  long  before  the  pioneers 
had  lost  the  immediate  sense  of  kindred  with  those  who 
had  remained  in  the  older  states.  Nothing  like  this,  so 
far  as  we  know,  has  ever  happened  in  the  history  -of 
any  other  land.  Not  only  is  it  to  be  said  in  a  general  way 
that  the  early  stock  of  New  England  or  Pennsylvania,  of 
Virginia  or  North  Carolina,  spread  westward,  forming  new 
communities  across  a  continent,  but  the  movement  is  to 
be  illustrated  in  a  much  more  striking  way  by  the  migra- 
tion and  spread  of  particular  families.  Elsewhere  and  in 
other  times  family  clans  and  patriarchal  groups  have  held 
together  within  limited  areas.  But  in  this  country,  as 
many  a  genealogical  compilation  will  show,  the  families 
have  spread  straight  across  the  country,  increasing  and 
multiplying  under  favorable  conditions  afforded  by  new 
soils  and  ample  room,  until  a  great  nation  has  been  formed 
within  three  or  four  generations,  essentially  based  upon 
this  spread  of  interrelated  families. 

Although,  as  I  have  said,  this  movement  to  new  lands  was 


38    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

mainly  upon  east  and  west  lines,  there  was  in  Ohio,  Indiana, 
and  Illinois  a  blending  of  the  settlers  from  New  England, 
the  Middle  States,  Virginia,  and  the  Carolinas.  But  with 
the  growth  of  slavery  and  its  new  economic  importance, 
the  fear  and  danger  of  disunion  led  to  various  political 
compromises,  among  which  was  the  understanding  that 
some  of  the  new  states  should  be  slave  territory  and  others 
should  be  free.  Missouri  had  been  admitted  in  1821  as 
a  slave  state.  By  all  natural  conditions  of  soil  and  cli- 
mate and  tendency  of  population,  it  should  have  been  a 
free  state  like  Illinois.  Texas  came  into  the  Union  in  1845 
by  a  different  method,  with  slavery  already  existing  as  a 
domestic  institution. 

In  the  states  north  of  the  Ohio  River,  formed  from  the 
lands  ceded  by  the  northern  and  middle  colonies  and  Vir- 
ginia, the  Ordinance  of  1787  declared  that  slavery  should 
never  exist.  It  provided  for  the  equal  division  of  estates 
among  children  in  the  descent  of  property,  with  a  view  to 
the  building  up  of  democratic  communities,  based  upon 
landownership.  One  of  the  chief  purposes  of  the  Ordinance 
was  declared  to  be  the  "extending  of  the  fundamental 
principles  of  civil  and  religious  liberty,  which  form  the  basis 
whereon  these  republics,  their  laws  and  constitutions,  are 
erected ;  to  fix  and  establish  those  principles  as  the  basis 
of  all  laws,  constitutions,  and  governments,  which  forever 
hereafter  shall  be  formed  in  the  said  territory." 

Elsewhere  in  the  Ordinance  it  is  declared,  "Religion, 
morality,  and  knowledge  being  necessary  to  good  govern- 
ment and  the  happiness  of  mankind,  schools  and  the  means 
of  education  shall  forever  be  encouraged."  According  to 
the  terms  of  the  Ordinance,  the  territory  was  later  divided 
into  the  five  states  of  Ohio,  Indiana,  Illinois,  Michigan,  and 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       39 

Wisconsin.  It  established  principles  both  positive  and 
negative  which  were  intended  to  build  up  states  upon  the 
ideals  of  equality,  freedom,  private  property,  and  demo- 
cratic government.  Some  especial  considerations  were 
extended  to  the  existing  French  communities,  but  these  were 
small,  and  it  was  perfectly  understood  that  the  new  states 
would  become  the  home  of  English-speaking  Americans, 
who  would  generalize,  so  to  speak,  the  peculiarities  of  the 
Eastern  colonies  and  produce  the  national  type. 

Such  statesmanlike  forethought  was  amply  rewarded. 
For  the  settlement  of  those  states  of  the  old  Northwest 
Territory  under  the  conditions  prescribed  was  of  incompar- 
able importance  in  the  creation  of  that  body  of  citizenship 
which  has  rendered  the  nation  one  and  indivisible,  as  a 
matter  of  underlying  fact,  regardless  of  legal  theories. 

Three  years  later,  the  principles  of  the  Ordinance  of  1787 
were  applied  to  the  territory  south  of  the  Ohio  River, 
Virginia  having  ceded  to  the  Union  what  is  now  Kentucky, 
and  North  Carolina  having  made  a  similar  grant  of  what  is 
now  Tennessee.  In  1798  there  was  organized  under  act  of 
Congress  what  was  called  the  Mississippi  Territory,  Georgia 
having  ceded  to  the  United  States  its  rights  and  claims  over 
the  lands  which  now  comprise  the  states  of  Mississippi  and 
Alabama.  With  the  sole  exception  of  the  clause  forever 
prohibiting  slavery  and  involuntary  servitude,  the  Ordi- 
nance of  1787,  providing  for  the  government  of  the  Ohio 
country,  was  extended  to  the  Mississippi  Territory  as  it 
had  been  to  Kentucky  and  Tennessee.  This  Ordinance  had 
declared  among  other  things  that  "the  said  territory  and 
the  states  which  may  be  formed  therein  shall  forever  re- 
main a  part  of  this  confederacy  of  the  United  States  of 
America." 


40     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

One  of  the  striking  declarations  of  that  great  Ordinance 
reads  as  follows :  — 

"  The  utmost  good  faith  shall  always  be  observed  towards 
the  Indians ;  their  lands  and  properties  shall  never  be  taken 
from  them  without  their  consent;  and  in  their  property, 
rights,  and  liberty,  they  never  shall  be  invaded  or  disturbed, 
unless  in  just  and  lawful  wars  authorized  by  Congress ;  but 
laws  founded  in  justice  and  humanity  shall  from  time  to 
time  be  made  for  preventing  wrongs  being  done  to  them 
and  for  preserving  peace  and  friendship  with  them." 

Thus  the  things  chiefly  characteristic  of  the  institutions 
and  people  of  the  great  series  of  states  west  of  the  Appa- 
lachian Mountains  and  east  of  the  Mississippi  River  were 
described  in  the  Ordinance  of  1787.  These  states  were  to 
belong  forever  to  an  American  nationality  that  was  to  rest 
upon  high  principles  of  character  and  intelligence.  What 
I  wish  to  emphasize  is  the  fact  that  the  essentials  of  their 
political  structure  and  social  life  were  carefully  provided 
in  advance  and  laid  down  for  them  through  the  collective 
wisdom  and  the  best  judgment  and  experience  of  the  United 
States.  It  was  the  intention  of  Congress  to  create  a  homo- 
geneous citizenship,  with  a  similarity  of  local  and  general 
institutions,  in  all  the  states  to  be  formed  out  of  the  national 
domain.  Citizenship  was  conceived  of  as  belonging  to  a  like- 
conditioned  body  of  free  white  men. 

It  was  clearly  perceived  that  great  and  serious  practical 
difficulties  were  to  be  encountered  through  the  existence 
of  two  alien  races  —  Indians  and  Negroes  —  which  could 
not  be  absorbed  or  assimilated.  North  of  the  Ohio  it  was 
feasible  to  exclude  slavery.  South  of  the  Ohio  such  ex- 
clusion could  not  be  agreed  upon,  and  it  was  left  for  the 
states  in  the  future  to  deal  with  it  as  a  domestic  problem. 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       41 

It  was  generally  expected  at  that  time  that  the  new  states 
south  of  the  Ohio  would  be  built  up  by  farmers  cultivating 
their  own  lands,  and  the  subsequent  importance  of  the 
slavery  question  from  the  economic  and  from  the  political 
standpoints  was  foreseen  only  dimly  if  at  all. 

The  Indian  question,  on  the  other  hand,  was  everywhere, 
west  of  the  Appalachians,  a  serious  and  difficult  one.  How- 
ever great  at  times  may  have  been  the  practical  injustice 
of  our  treatment  of  particular  Indian  tribes,  it  is  to  be 
remembered  that  it  has  been  the  intention  of  the  govern- 
ment and  of  the  people  as  a  whole  to  act  fairly  toward  the 
natives  of  the  country.  The  tribes  with  which  we  had  to 
deal  were  without  agriculture  except  of  the  most  limited 
sort,  were  nomadic  in  their  habits,  and  held  their  lands  only 
in  the  sense  of  having  a  prescriptive  right  to  roam  over  them 
in  their  pursuit  of  wild  animals.  These  Indians  were  few 
in  numbers,  and  as  our  forefathers  needed  lands  for  orderly 
settlement,  it  was  necessary  for  the  general  government  to 
extinguish  the  Indian  title  by  some  form  of  agreement  with 
tribal  chieftains,  based  on  the  analogy  of  international 
treaties. 

The  process  has  been  a  long  and  continuing  one,  and  it 
would  be  both  interesting  and  instructive  to  trace  the  effect 
of  our  contacts  and  relationships  with  the  Indian  as  affect- 
ing the  development  of  what  is  most  distinctive  in  American 
citizenship  and  character.  Certain  Indian  traits  and 
qualities  —  those  of  physical  courage  and  endurance,  of 
silence  and  stoicism  under  conditions  of  danger  and  diffi- 
culty, of  a  certain  unassailable  personal  dignity  —  have 
for  a  hundred  years  unquestionably  so  affected  the  Ameri- 
can mind  as  to  have  entered  very  deeply  into  the  quality 
of  what  we  may  call  American  personality.  If  all  our 


42     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

pioneers  were  not  at  some  time  engaged  in  Indian  fighting, 
they  were  all  schooled  in  the  need  of  being  prepared  for  it. 
Outside  of  our  Eastern  cities,  every  American  boy  until 
within  a  very  recent  period  has  been  trained  in  the  use  of 
arms,  has  had  some  knowledge  of  wild  animals  and  wood- 
craft, and  has  imbibed  something  of  that  personal  initiative, 
resourcefulness,  and  capacity  for  self-directed  action  that 
could  not  have  come  alone  from  our  early  provisions  for 
democratic  equality  and  universal  education.  It  came  in 
large  part  from  the  experience  of  subduing  a  great  continent 
and  from  the  actual  or  traditional  dealings  of  our  people 
with  so  remarkable  a  man  as  the  American  Indian. 

The  obtaining  of  Indian  lands,  the  carrying  on  of  Indian 
wars,  the  relocating  of  Indians  on  substituted  lands  farther 
west,  the  dealing  with  them  on  reservations,  the  attempts 
to  educate  them  and  to  fit  them  for  modern  economic  life, 
and  the  constant  efforts  of  philanthropists  and  idealists 
to  give  practical  effect  -to  our  national  pledges  of  justice 
toward  the  Indians,  have  provided  us  with  a  series  of  prob- 
lems of  government  and  administration  from  which  we  have 
never  at  any  time  been  wholly  free. 

In  Mexico  the  Indians  were  never  supplanted,  but  en- 
tered into  the  body  of  citizenship.  The  result  must  be  a 
slow  and  uncertain  experiment  in  the  creation  of  a  new 
nationality  of  mixed  racial  origin,  with  the  Spanish  lan- 
guage as  one  of  its  chief  uniting  bonds.  One-fifth  of  the 
Mexican  population  is  white,  with  some  small  infusion  of 
Indian  blood.  Two-fifths  is  of  thoroughly  mixed  racial 
character,  and  about  two-fifths  almost  purely  Indian. 
The  Indian  racial  type  is  evidently  destined  to  prevail  in 
Mexico,  and  the  process  of  race  amalgamation  will  go 
steadily  forward.  It  will  be  a  slow  and  difficult  task,  but 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       43 

not  an  impossible  one,  to  bring  this  Mexican  population 
up  to  a  much  higher  average  standard  of  intelligence  and 
efficiency  than  now  prevails. 

Our  methods  of  agricultural  settlement  and  advance 
almost  wholly  precluded  intermarriage.  Our  conditions 
were  incomparably  more  favorable  than  those  of  the  Span- 
iards in  Mexico.  We  were  dealing  with  a  small  number 
of  Indians,  relatively  speaking,  and  these  were  of  nomadic 
and  savage  character,  in  contrast  with  the  fixed  nature  of 
the  Indian  population  of  Mexico.  The  French,  on  the  con- 
trary, as  hunters  and  trappers  among  the  Canadian  Indians 
of  the  Northwest,  took  Indian  wives,  with  the  result  that 
there  arose  a  considerable  population  of  French-Indian 
half-breeds.  Here  again  the  number  of  Indians  is  small 
when  compared  with  the  rapid  development  of  the  white 
race,  and  Canada's  Indian  problem  will  be  solved  by  the 
complete  absorption  of  the  Indian  population  into  the  com- 
posite European  stock  that  is  building  up  the  Western 
Canadian  provinces. 

By  original  agreement  in  accepting  the  cession  of  the 
Mississippi  Territory  from  Georgia,  the  United  States  gov- 
ernment had  promised  to  extinguish  the  Indian  land  titles 
and  make  other  provision  for  the  Southern  red  tribes.  Out 
of  such  agreements  there  resulted  the  subsequent  creation 
of  the  so-called  "  Indian  Territory,"  whither,  from  time  to 
time,  were  removed  the  Choctaws,  Creeks,  Seminoles,  and 
many  other  entire  or  fractional  tribes.  These  Indians 
have  been  fortunately  situated  and  well  protected  in  their 
rights,  and  they  have  adopted  so  many  white  men  into  their 
tribal  organizations  that  the  full-blooded  Indians  are  now 
in  a  small  minority.  A  gradual  opening  up  of  these 
Indian  lands  to  white  settlement  resulted  some  years  ago 


44    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

in  the  setting  apart  of  the  temporary  territory  of  Okla- 
homa. We  have  just  now  witnessed  the  reunion  of  Okla- 
homa and  what  was  left  of  the  old  Indian  Territory,  and 
the  admission  of  the  whole  under  the  name  of  Oklahoma 
as  a  state  in  the  Union. 

The  process  has  been  marked  by  great  care,  in  the  dis- 
tribution of  lands  in  severalty  to  Indian  families  and  in- 
dividuals, and  by  various  provisions  to  protect  the  Indians 
in  all  their  rights  of  person  and  property  during  a  future 
transitional  period.  All  these  red  men  of  the  Indian  Ter- 
ritory will  enter  into  full  American  citizenship,  and  the  pro- 
cess of  absorption  into  the  white  race  will  go  on  through 
intermarriage  without  further  hindrance  or  difficulty. 

Gradually  through  long  experience  we  are  learning  how 
to  deal  more  intelligently  with  the  Indians  now  segregated 
in  Western  reservations.  The  government's  policy  of 
providing  schools  for  the  Indian  children  is  constantly 
growing  wiser  in  its  practical  methods,  and  although  the 
aboriginal  instincts  are  stubborn  and  hard  to  overcome, 
the  inexorable  pressure  of  our  white  population  will  either 
absorb  the  red  man  or  cause  his  numbers  to  dwindle  toward 
the  point  of  extinction.  As  a  subject  requiring  great  care 
and  intelligence  in  administration,  the  Indian  question 
will  remain  with  us  for  a  long  time.  But  as  a  question 
affecting  population  and  citizenship,  it  has  now  practically 
disappeared.  We  shall  always  owe  some  traits  and  quali- 
ties of  national  character  to  our  contact  with  the  North 
American  Indians,  but  we  shall  assimilate  them  as  a  race 
with  results  scarcely  perceptible. 

And  when  we  set  this  fact  in  contrast  with  the  actual 
racial  conditions  under  which  the  Republic  of  Mexico  is 
struggling,  we  shall  better  be  able  to  see  how  tremendous 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       45 

an  element  in  the  development  of  a  new  country,  from  the 
standpoint  of  its  social  and  political  problems,  is  that  of 
a  general  unity  of  race  and  stock  founded  upon  a  high 
average  of  intelligence  and  character  and  of  capacity  for 
citizenship.  Thus,  although  it  was  no  part  of  the  original 
American  theory  or  forecast  that  the  Indians  should  come 
into  our  citizenship,  the  process  of  race  absorption  is  dis- 
posing of  them,  or  will  ultimately  so  dispose  of  them,  as  an 
alien  factor  giving  rise  to  political  difficulties. 

The  other  original  race  problem,  that  of  the  Negroes  in 
the  United  States,  has  pursued  a  very  different  course  and 
remains  with  us  to-day  as  in  many  aspects  the  most  diffi- 
cult matter  with  which  we  have  now  and  in  the  future  to 
deal.  In  the  Northern  as  well  as  in  the  Southern  colonies 
there  existed  a  more  or  less  distinct  social  aristocracy 
founded  upon  ancestral  superiority  in  England,  or  else  upon 
large  holdings  of  land,  or  finally,  upon  educational  or  pro- 
fessional or  political  preferment.  Such  distinction;]  were 
not  sharply  drawn,  and  they  were  supported  by  no  special 
privileges  or  advantages  after  our  American  political  sys- 
tem had  become  fairly  developed.  American  fundamental 
policy  was  indeed  a  leveling  policy,  but  it  sought  to  estab- 
lish a  very  high  level.  It  did  not  presuppose  uniformity 
of  results  when  it  established,  so  far  as  laws  and  institu- 
tions went,  equality  of  opportunity. 

What  it  did,  however,  presuppose  was  a  very  high  degree 
of  social  mobility.  It  meant  that  the  landless  man  should 
easily  become  a  landholder  by  the  simple  process  of  joining 
the  pioneers  and  moving  westward.  It  meant  that  the 
apprentice  in  any  trade  could  easily  become  a  journeyman, 
and  that  the  journeyman  should  readily  become  an  em- 
ployer. It  meant  that  the  aspiring  boy,  however  humble 


46     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

his  parentage,  should  have  such  an  educational  start  that 
he  might  easily  work  his  way  into  the  learned  professions. 
It  meant  that  the  private  citizen  should  in  his  own  local 
community  have  such  frequent  occasion  to  take  part  in 
public  affairs  that  he  might  readily  advance  in  accordance 
with  his  aptitudes  and  character  to  the  higher  places  in 
state  and  national  public  life. 

One  of  the  chief  concerns  of  the  American  state,  in  the 
large  sense  of  that  word,  has  been  to  preserve  this  social  and 
political  mobility  and  to  prevent  the  crystallizing  of  our 
population  into  castes  or  classes  by  any  process  whatso- 
ever. The  public  schools,  which  have,  upon  the  whole, 
been  our  most  uniform  and  vital  institution,  in  this  process 
of  creating  and  maintaining  a  high  level  of  citizenship 
as  well  as  a  social  and  industrial  mobility,  have  always 
very  properly  been  a  matter  of  deep  public  concern.  And 
it  is  important  to  note  that  at  the  present  time,  with  the 
problems  of  citizenship  presenting  themselves  in  new  phases, 
the  public  schools  are  recognized  as  more  than  ever  the 
crucibles  in  which  elements  of  discord  are  to  be  blended 
and  fused,  and  a  harmonious  citizenship  on  the  high  levels 
of  democratic  efficiency  well  maintained. 

But  of  this  work  of  the  public  schools  in  our  political 
life,  I  shall  have  occasion  to  speak  further.  I  was  about  to 
remark  that,  although  Virginia  and  the  Southern  colonies  had 
from  the  first  been  less  democratic  in  their  population  than 
the  Northern  colonies,  they  were  by  no  means  committed 
to  an  aristocratic  system.  It  happened  that  a  good  many 
Virginia  landowners  had  come  with  the  traditions  of  the 
country  squires  of  England,  and  that  a  large  number  of 
laborers  had  come  over  indentured,  from  the  ignorant 
and  unprivileged  working-classes.  Yet  these  inequalities 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       47 

would  have  adjusted  themselves  in  due  time  if  it  had  not 
been  for  the  gradual  development  of  negro  slavery.  Land 
was  abundant  and  easily  acquired,  the  poorer  classes  were 
rapidly  catching  the  independent  spirit  of  the  westward 
pioneer  movement,  and  the  statesmen  who  framed  the 
northwestern  ordinance  for  Ohio,  and  who  applied  its  pro- 
visions three  years  later  to  Kentucky  and  Tennessee,  and 
eight  years  later  to  the  territory  that  soon  afterward  be- 
came Mississippi  and  Alabama,  had  no  thought  of  the 
development  of  different  agricultural,  economic,  or  social 
systems  north  and  south  of  the  Ohio  River. 

When  the  new  states  were  admitted  to  the  Union,  South 
as  well  as  North,  all  the  unoccupied  lands  belonged  abso- 
lutely in  fee  simple  to  the  national  government  by  express 
acknowledgment  of  the  states  themselves.  These  lands 
were  to  be  sold  under  uniform  laws  and  conditions,  and 
everybody  expected  to  see  the  same  kind  of  American 
agricultural  commonwealths  in  the  South  as  in  the  North. 
Slavery  was  looked  upon  as  a  thing  to  be  tolerated  for  the 
present,  but  as  a  thing  exceptional,  undesirable,  not  com- 
patible with  conditions  of  American  life,  and  therefore 
temporary. 

There  was  nothing  in  the  nature  of  the  climate,  nothing 
in  the  soil,  nothing  in  the  people,  to  make  Kentucky  or 
Tennessee,  or  even  the  highland  parts  of  Alabama  or  Mis- 
sissippi, in  any  way  essentially  different  from  Ohio,  Indi- 
ana, or  Illinois.  We  simply  drifted,  without  a  dream  of 
the  dire  consequences,  into  an  immense  expansion  of 
the  slavery  system  through  a  series  of  circumstances  and 
historical  causes.  For  one  thing,  we  were  near  the  West 
Indies,  where  the  lack  of  white  labor  and  the  profits  from 
sugar,  tobacco,  and  other  products,  brought  about  a  large 


48    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

and  rapid  development  of  the  negro  slave  system,  and 
afforded  enormously  profitable  trade  in  slaves  on  the  one 
hand,  and  in  sugar,  rum,  and  various  commodities  on  the 
other  hand,  for  the  hardy  seafaring  men  of  the  New 
England  coast. 

The  warmer,  alluvial  parts  of  our  South  adopted  the  plan- 
tation methods  of  the  West  Indies,  and  in  the  lack  of  white 
labor  began  to  acquire  increasing  numbers  of  negroes.  In 
extending  the  provisions  of  the  Ordinance  of  1787  to  the 
new  Southern  territories,  while  not  prohibiting  the  insti- 
tution of  slavery,  we  had  expressly  prohibited  the  impor- 
tation of  slaves  from  outside  the  country.  Subsequently, 
in  1808,  we  had  abolished  the  foreign  slave-trade  altogether. 
From  that  time  forth  the  demands  of  the  lower  South  for 
negro  labor  had  to  be  supplied  from  the  more  northerly 
states,  and  the  domestic  slave-trade  became  a  profitable 
form  of  migration. 

After  a  time  it  became  apparent  that  negro  slavery  was 
very  much  interfering  with  the  right  kind  of  social  demo- 
cratic progress  among  the  Southern  white  people.  It 
was  accentuating  an  aristocratic  class  of  land-owning, 
slave-owning  people,  and  it  was  putting  obstacles  in  the 
way  of  the  prosperity  of  the  white  majority  who  would 
otherwise  have  been  owning  and  cultivating  rich  farms, 
as  in  the  states  north  of  the  Ohio  River.  The  drift  of  these 
poorer  whites  was  to  the  hills  and  mountains  of  western 
Virginia,  eastern  Kentucky,  western  North  Carolina,  east- 
ern Tennessee,  northern  and  western  Georgia,  and  northern 
Alabama.  Into  these  regions  of  forest  upland  the  slavery 
system  did  not  penetrate,  but  the  soil  was  too  poor  for 
successful  agriculture,  the  people  lost  touch  with  the 
outside  world,  and  declined,  rather  than  gained,  in  culture 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP      49 

and  civilization.  Thus  the  South  was  greatly  hampered 
in  the  development  of  a  social  democracy  on  a  high  level 
of  intelligence  and  political  capacity. 

But  the  far  more  serious  difficulty  that  men  began  to 
foresee  lay  in  the  numerical  growth  of  a  great  body  of 
African  laborers,  domiciled  in  an  extending  group  of  our 
states,  and  forming  an  element  which  could  never  be  ab- 
sorbed in  that  great  social  and  political  brotherhood  which 
was  the  ideal  of  American  citizenship  and  which  originally 
looked  upon  our  nation  as  one  great  family,  like  the 
Jewish  commonwealth  of  old.  Then  began  the  efforts 
of  the  American  Colonization  Society,  whose  underlying 
motives  were  not  chiefly  those  of  the  abolitionist,  but 
those  of  far-seeing  men  who  could  discern  nothing  but 
danger  and  difficulty  in  the  future  presence  here  of  great 
bodies  of  negroes,  whether  slave  or  free. 

Their  movement  came  too  late,  however,  to  be  of  any 
practical  effect.  It  was  helpless,  like  a  floating  plank, 
against  the  strong  economic  tide  that  was  moving  in  the 
opposite  direction. 

We  should  have  grown  cotton  even  more  successfully, 
maintained  a  homogeneous  citizenship,  and  avoided  a 
majority  of  our  most  dangerous  and  exasperating  political 
problems,  if  we  had  never  introduced  African  slavery  at 
all.  But  the  movement  of  history  grows  out  of  causes  too 
complex  to  be  perfectly  regulated  at  a  given  moment  by 
the  collective  intelligence  or  virtue  of  any  community. 
Consequences  are  not  discernible  from  the  beginning,  and 
nations  have  to  learn  by  experience. 

At  least  it  may  be  said  that  the  experience  of  one  evil 
may  show  how  to  avert  another.  For  one  thing,  our  ex- 
perience with  slavery  has  shown  us  in  the  larger  problems 


50    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

of  our  political  life  that  we  must  so  apply  statesmanship 
as  to  prevent  those  social  or  sectional  divergences  which 
might  go  too  far  for  reconciliation,  and  lead  to  disunion  or 
civil  war.  The  existence  of  slavery  as  a  developing  eco- 
nomic system  created  differences  of  growing  intensity  which 
would  otherwise  have  had  no  reason  to  exist.  Extreme 
theories  of  states'  rights  have  in  logic  no  natural  abiding 
place  in  this  country,  unless  in  the  smaller  of  the  original 
colonies,  like  Rhode  Island  and  Delaware.  Otherwise 
those  doctrines  are  merely  shifting  symptoms  appearing 
now  here,  now  there,  at  the  moment  when  some  state 
or  locality  is  conscious  of  a  separate  interest,  or  rankles 
with  some  sense  of  injustice. 

But  as  the  South  grew  into  a  prosperity  based  upon  the 
slave  system,  it  began  to  seek  justification.  It  set  up  the 
new  theory  that  the  Southern  people  were  essentially  unlike 
the  Northern  in  origin  and  characteristics,  that  their  coun- 
try was  radically  different  in  climate  and  soil,  that  its 
economic  institutions  must  be  permanently  different,  and 
that  accordingly  its  domestic  and  foreign  policies  should 
also  have  a  permanently  different  character. 

Unity  of  sentiment  and  of  ideals  is  what,  more  than  any- 
thing else,  binds  a  people  together.  This  dwelling  upon 
imaginary  differences  rapidly  produced  real  differences. 
That  is  to  say,  there  arose  a  divergence  of  sentiment  and  a 
wall  of  prejudice  between  North  and  South  that  made 
the  normal  working  of  political  life  practically  impossible. 

All  this  was  intensified  by  the  form  in  which  anti-slavery 
sentiment  began  to  assert  itself  in  the  North.  Slavery  had 
grown  in  this  country  as  an  institution  in  such  a  way  that 
it  was  neither  sensible  nor  just  to  attribute  blame  in  any 
quarter.  Mr.  Lincoln  approached  the  question  with  a  per- 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       51 

fectly  normal  mind.  He  saw  that  the  country  could  not  go 
on  successfully  if  the  spread  of  slavery  were  not  restricted 
by  its  exclusion  from  the  territories.  Kansas  had  been 
kept  free  by  the  superior  numbers  and  energy  of  the  anti- 
slavery  Northern  and  Western  people  as  colonizers.  Men 
like  Mr.  Lincoln  would  have  calmed  the  excited  apprehen- 
sion of  the  South,  and  would  meanwhile  have  built  up  the 
great  West  with  such  a  development  of  free  American  citi- 
zens, recruited  by  millions  of  sturdy  emigrants  from  Euro- 
pean countries,  as  to  have  given  the  united  forces  of  our 
modern  social  democracy  an  unquestioned  advantage. 
The  growth  of  railroads  and  the  advance  of  modern 
industry  would  in  due  time  have  invaded  the  slave  states 
in  such  a  way  as  to  prove  that  the  economic  advantages 
of  slavery  were  only  temporary  in  their  character.  Then 
would  have  come  about  some  just  and  statesmanlike  scheme 
for  emancipation. 

But  the  New  England  conscience,  —  which  had  played  so 
valuable  a  part  in  the  making  of  American  ideals,  and  which 
had  done  so  much  to  evolve  that  sense  of  public  spirit  and 
social  justice,  apart  from  personal  or  private  advantage, 
which  has  molded  the  citizenship  of  the  country,  and  shaped 
its  practical  political  issues,  —  had  come  to  look  at  the 
slavery  question  primarily  from  the  standpoint  of  abstract 
human  rights.  It  would  be  as  useless  to  quarrel  with  this 
phase  of  American  idealism  as  to  try  to  argue  down  the  east 
wind.  The  passion  against  slavery,  as  in  violation  of  the 
fundamental  principle  of  human  liberty,  grew  to  such  a 
point  that  the  unity  of  the  country  was  menaced  quite  as 
much  by  the  impatience  and  bitterness  of  the  Northern 
abolitionists  as  by  the  crystallizing  of  doctrine  and  senti- 
ment in  the  South. 


52     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

This  passion  for  human  freedom  and  for  the  imme- 
diate translation  into  terms  of  practical  American  political 
life  of  the  abstract  theories  of  the  rights  of  man,  was  in 
total  disregard  of  the  normal  processes  of  historical  and 
political  evolution.  But  it  is  a  plain  fact  of  ordinary 
observation  that  history  is  not  content  to  move  by  orderly 
process.  An  intense  sentiment,  like  that  which  existed  in 
the  South,  or  a  great  passion  for  abstract  right  and  justice, 
like  that  which  was  growing  in  the  North,  is  quite  as  likely 
as  anything  else  to  create  political  issues  and  problems. 
These  feelings  proceed  to  make  or  mar  the  page  of  history, 
without  regard  to  the  warnings  of  the  discerning  and  the 
dispassionate.  In  other  words,  that  very  capacity  for  social 
and  political  idealism,  and  for  devotion  to  abstract  concep- 
tions of  right  and  justice,  which  had  done  so  much  to  give 
the  American  people  its  solidarity  and  its  elevation,  was 
the  factor  that  most  endangered  its  continuance,  when 
diverging  tendencies  had  on  both  sides  led  to  conflict  for 
the  sake  of  high  principle. 

I  dwell  upon  this  because  it  is  with  us  an  ever  recurring 
tendency.  The  chief  danger  in  several  of  our  moments 
or  periods  of  political  crisis  has  arisen  from  the  fact  that 
both  sides  have  conceived  of  their  respective  positions  as 
theoretically  and  ideally  just.  Thus,  each  side,  so  far  at 
least  as  the  rank  and  file  were  concerned,  came  to  feel  that 
it  was  contending  unselfishly  for  high  principles  and  a  true 
cause. 

Ever  since  the  conclusion  of  the  Civil  War,  the  Southern 
negro  question  has  in  countless  ways  played  a  vital  part  in 
our  larger  political  life  as  well  as  in  the  local  political  life 
of  the  South  itself.  And  very  much  of  the  strain  and  diffi- 
culty attending  the  injection  of  this  question  into  the  national 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       53 

life  has  been  due  to  the  intensity  of  theoretical  views  and 
convictions.  I  shall  have  occasion  to  recur  to  the  negro 
question  in  several  of  its  political  phases,  but  meanwhile 
let  us  turn  to  some  other  questions  relating  to  our  popula- 
tion and  citizenship,  and  having  a  bearing  upon  the  prob- 
lems of  our  political  life. 

Soon  after  the  Revolutionary  War,  our  adventurous 
young  Americans  were  flocking  westward,  taking  up  lands 
under  military  grants  to  Revolutionary  soldiers,  and  found- 
ing communities  as  far  west  as  the  Mississippi  River.  I 
need  not  pause  here  to  speak  of  negotiations  for  the  acquisi- 
tion of  the  Florida  country  or  for  the  free  navigation  of  the 
mouths  of  the  Mississippi.  It  became  our  good  fortune, 
through  the  exigency  of  high  politics,  due  to  the  French 
Revolution  and  the  Napoleonic  struggle,  to  acquire  the 
great  Louisiana  country.  Our  experience  in  creating  the 
newer  sovereignties  east  of  the  Mississippi  was  promptly 
applied  to  the  situations  farther  west.  We  were  prepar- 
ing what  were  soon  to  be  unequaled  opportunities  for  fifty 
millions  or  a  hundred  millions  of  people.  These  facts  were 
not  to  be  turned  into  immediate  realities,  but  success  was 
assured  with  reasonable  effort. 

As  I  have  already  said,  the  people  in  our  original  colonies 
were  more  well-to-do  in  their  average  lot,  even  in  the  period 
before  the  Revolution,  than  any  like  number  of  people  in 
the  countries  from  which  they  had  come.  In  the  period  fol- 
lowing the  Revolution,  in  spite  of  the  episode  of  our  second 
war  with  England,  our  economic  and  social  conditions  were 
vastly  more  agreeable  than  those  of  European  lands.  If, 
therefore,  the  opportunities  afforded  by  the  growth  of  Ohio, 
Indiana,  Illinois,  and  the  other  northwestern  states,  were 
sufficient  to  tempt  hundreds  of  thousands  of  the  younger 


54    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

generation  to  leave  the  old  homesteads  of  New  England, 
New  York,  and  Pennsylvania,  while  the  sons  of  Virginia, 
the  Carolinas,  and  Georgia  were  flocking  across  the  moun- 
tains to  Tennessee,  Alabama,  Missouri,  and  Arkansas,  it 
is  not  strange  that  conditions  thus  inviting  should  have 
appealed  to  many  people  living  under  less  favored  circum- 
stances in  the  European  countries. 

Men  migrate  for  a  great  variety  of  reasons.  It  had  taken 
strong  motives  and  high  resolution  to  create  our  original 
settlements  in  the  early  part  of  the  seventeenth  century. 
Whether  they  were  seeking  opportunities  to  exercise  prin- 
ciples of  civil  and  religious  liberty,  or  hoped  to  profit  by 
finding  precious  metals  or  by  trade  with  the  Indians,  they 
were  a  picked  and  hardy  lot  of  men  and  women ;  and  in  the 
struggle  to  give  permanence  to  their  settlements,  they 
created  unsurpassed  opportunities  for  their  own  posterity 
as  well  as  for  millions  of  later  comers. 

An  immense  variety  of  circumstances  has  cooperated 
to  bring  about  such  a  movement  of  alien  population  to  our 
shores  as  history  does  not  parallel.  Early  migrations 
had  brought  a  considerable  German  population  to  this  coun- 
try, and  it  had  located  chiefly  in  Pennsylvania.  But  most 
of  our  population  had  been  derived  from  the  British  Islands. 
The  Scotch-Irish  had  become  very  numerous  in  the  Middle 
States  and  had  followed  the  valleys  of  the  Appalachian 
system  southward,  and  their  families  have  increased  and 
multiplied  as  one  of  the  most  important  factors  of  the  essen- 
tial American  stock.  With  the  firm  establishment  of  the 
American  republic,  British  and  German  immigrants  came 
steadily  enough  to  have  added  important  new  elements 
to  our  population  previous  to  1845.  But  the  movement 
on  a  very  lar^o  scale  began  at  about  that  time, 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP      55 

The  great  Irish  famine,  clue  to  successive  failures  of  the 
potato  crop,  was  at  its  worst  in  1846,  and  the  migration  of 
Irish  people  to  the  United  States,  which  had  averaged  about 
thirty  thousand  a  year,  at  once  increased  to  more  than 
one  hundred  thousand.  In  the  decade  from  1845  to  1855 
more  than  a  million  and  a  half  of  Irish  people  came  to  this 
country.  In  that  same  period  there  was  a  similar  increase 
in  the  movement  of  Germans,  due  in  great  part  to  political 
trouble  and  discontent,  and  to  apprehensions  of  war.  The 
wave  of  liberalism  that  swept  across  Europe  in  1848  and 
thereabouts  resulted  in  sending  to  our  shores  a  large  body 
of  people  of  a  desirable  class.  Our  own  financial  and  eco- 
nomic reaction,  culminating  in  the  panic  of  1857,  together 
with  the  gathering  of  storm  clouds  over  our  political  skies, 
sharply  reduced  the  volume  of  immigration  in  the  years 
immediately  before  the  Civil  War.  But  from  1845  to  the 
outbreak  of  the  war,  we  had  received  in  fifteen  years 
a  million  and  a  half  Germans,  two  million  Irish  people, 
and  more  than  half  a  million  people  of  other  European 
nationalities. 

At  the  time  when  the  westward  movement  had  fairly 
set  in  after  the  opening  of  the  Northwest  Territory  and  the 
new  country  south  of  the  Ohio,  there  was  an  almost  even 
division  of  population  between  the  North  and  the  South. 
But  in  1860,  when  the  country  had  reached  a  population  of 
31,400,000,  21,000,000,  or  more  than  two-thirds,  were  in 
the  free  states  and  territories,  as  against  a  little  more  than 
10,000,000  in  the  slave  states,  of  whom  more  than  3,000,000 
were  slaves.  European  immigrants  had  not  been  willing 
to  go  to  the  slave  states  (with  such  limited  exceptions  as 
the  German  accessions  to  St.  Louis  and  some  other  com- 
mercial towns).  The  North  and  West,  on  the  other  hand, 


56     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

were  building  railroads  and  developing  farm  lands  and  new 
population  centers.  There  was  a  great  demand  for  labor 
such  as  the  fresh  contingents  of  Irish  and  Germans  afforded. 

Our  cities  were  then  relatively  small,  and  the  new  foreign 
elements  came  so  rapidly  as  to  create  new  and  difficult 
problems.  "Know-nothingism,"  a  form  of  organized  oppo- 
sition to  foreign  domination,  provoked  chiefly  by  the  voting 
strength  of  the  Irish  in  the  cities,  made  its  brief  political 
sensation,  only  to  be  lost  in  the  more  serious  controversies 
of  a  stormy  decade.  Statisticians  differ  as  to  the  number 
of  people  North  and  West  who,  at  the  outbreak  of  the  Civil 
War,  were  of  foreign  birth  or  the  descendants  of  immigrants 
who  had  arrived  within  thirty  or  forty  years.  It  is  at  least 
conservative  to  estimate  that  of  the  21,000,000,  fully  one- 
third,  or  from  7,000,000  to  8,000,000,  belonged  to  what  we 
may  call  our  foreign  element.  Many  of  them  had  come  to 
escape  European  wars,  but  they  were  drawn  into  our 
contest,  and  they  clearly  turned  the  balance. 

With  the  conclusion  of  the  war,  we  entered  upon  a  period 
of  unprecedented  expansion.  The  death  losses  of  the  war 
had  been  great,  but  the  development  of  capacity  and  energy 
in  the  surviving  two  million  or  more  of  young  men  who 
had  borne  arms  was  speedily  transmuted  into  a  wonderful 
national  asset.  The  opening  of  the  West  was  entered  upon 
with  stupendous  energy,  the  industrial  life  of  the  nation 
grew  more  mature  and  complex,  and  the  demand  for  labor 
far  outstripped  the  home  supply.  The  Western  states  set 
up  official  immigration  bureaus;  the  Western  railroads, 
which  had  obtained  vast  land  grants,  conducted  immi- 
gration bureaus  of  their  own;  and  the  steamship  com- 
panies, finding  the  business  profitable,  did  everything 
in  their  power  to  stimulate  the  movement  of  population 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       57 

to  America.  Most  important  of  all,  however,  was  the 
propaganda  conducted  by  the  immigrants  themselves. 
Thus,  immediately  following  the  Civil  War,  there  was  an- 
other large  accession,  reaching  its  climax  just  before  the 
period  of  hard  times  that  followed  the  panic  of  1873.  In 
1880  the  movement  set  in  again  very  strongly,  and  in 
1882  nearly  800,000  landed  at  our  ports.  Not  until  1903 
was  this  number  exceeded  or  nearly  reached,  but  there  had 
been  for  many  years  an  average  annual  arrival  of  about 
half  a  million.  In  1905  the  number  exceeded  a  million, 
and  in  1906  it  was  beyond  1,100,000. 

For  some  years  past,  moreover,  there  had  been  a  total 
change  in  the  racial  character  of  immigrants,  due  to  changed 
conditions  in  Europe.  Ireland  was  now  under-populated, 
and  Irish  political  and  social  discontent  had  been  allayed 
through  numerous  political  reforms.  German  industrial 
progress  had  become  so  great  as  to  have  improved  economic 
conditions  at  home,  and  the  tide  of  emigration  had  been 
much  reduced  in  consequence.  In  Italy,  on  the  other 
hand,  there  had  been  large  growth  of  surplus  population, 
with  small  corresponding  development  of  industrial  oppor- 
tunity. Just  as  in  this  country  at  certain  periods  the 
migratory  spirit  has  affected  entire  districts,  as  when 
northern  New  England  poured  into  Illinois  and  Iowa; 
Ohio  into  Kansas  and  Missouri ;  or  Iowa  into  the  Dakotas, 
so  in  like  manner  from  time  to  time  the  American  fever  has 
swept  through  particular  districts  or  countries  of  Europe. 

It  affected  Sweden  and  Norway  to  such  an  extent  that 
there  are  perhaps  more  Scandinavians  in  our  Northwest  than 
are  left  in  Europe.  It  was  now  affecting  the  lower  half  of  the 
Italian  peninsula,  and  entire  neighborhoods  were  being  de- 
populated. An  equilibrium  will  in  due  time  be  established 


58    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

in  Italy,  the  migratory  fever  will  abate,  and  we  shall  have 
here  several  millions  of  Italians  and  their  descendants,  to 
whom  for  our  own  well-being  we  must  apply  our  principles 
and  methods  of  leveling  up. 

In  place  of  the  former  influx  of  people  from  the  German 
Empire,  we  were  now  receiving  hundreds  of  thousands  from 
the  strange  and  varied  nationalities  of  the  Austro-Hun- 
garian  Empire.  Previous  to  1880,  that  empire  did  not  fur- 
nish us  with  1  per  cent  of  our  immigrants.  It  was  in  1906 
supplying  25  per  cent  of  them.  Italy  was  also  supplying 
25  per  cent,  whereas  the  movement  of  Italians  was  very 
small  up  to  1890.  In  the  twenty  years  previous  to  1880, 
about  1  per  cent  of  our  immigrants  came  from  the  Russian 
Empire.^  Since  1890,  the  movement  from  Russia  had  been 
large  and  steadily  growing,  until  it  constituted  20  per  cent 
of  the  total.  At  the  present  time  (1907)  our  newcomers 
from  Europe  are  arriving  at  the  rate  of  about  a  million  a 
year,  of  whom  nearly  700,000  are  from  southern  and  eastern 
Europe,  including  about  150,000  Hebrews,  nearly  all  from 
Russia. 

In  proportion  to  our  total  population,  immigration  was 
larger  in  the  movement  that  culminated  in  1854  than  it 
has  been  at  any  time  since.  But  the  intensity  of  life  in 
the  Civil  War  period,  and  the  strength  of  the  agricultural 
and  industrial  movements  that  followed  the  war,  undoubt- 
edly had  a  fusing  and  transforming  effect  that  greatly  quick- 
ened the  process  of  Americanizing  the  foreign  elements. 
Having  in  mind  its  early  colonization,  —  which,  besides  the 
main  factors  from  the  British  Islands,  included  German, 
Dutch,  Swedish,  and  Swiss,  as  well  as  French  and  Spanish 
elements,  —  the  composite  American  nationality  did  not  lose 
faith  in  its  power  to  assimilate  all  comers. 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP       59 

Our  schools,  our  free  economic  life,  and  the  practice  of 
self-government  in  our  townships  and  villages  were  relied 
upon  to  turn  the  first  generation  of  foreigners  into  sym- 
pathetic, law-abiding,  and  useful  members  of  the  body 
politic,  and  to  bring  the  second  and  third  generations  into 
complete  unison  and  accord  with  all  the  distinctive  notes  of 
American  life. 

This  surely  was  a  great  deal  to  expect.  Whatever  might 
have  been  the  origins  of  the  major  part  of  the  early  Ameri- 
can stock,  we  had  trained  it  up  to  a  higher  average  of  moral, 
intellectual,  and  economic  well-being  than  could  be  found 
prevailing  anywhere  else.  Our  definite  object,  further- 
more, was  not  only  to  maintain  this  average,  but  to  advance 
it  as  the  nation  spread  out  across  the  richer  territories  of 
the  Mississippi  Valley.  Yet  we  were  proclaiming  the  doc- 
trine of  free  asylum  for  all  the  world,  were  welcoming  hordes 
of  laborers,  regardless  of  nationality  or  previous  condition, 
and  were  proposing  to  assimilate  and  absorb  them  without 
deteriorating  our  resulting  racial  composite.  It  was  a 
daring  experiment,  and  one  never  tried  elsewhere  on  any 
similar  scale  of  variety  and  magnitude.  Upon  an  impar- 
tial statement  of  the  facts  it  would  have  seemed  not  merely 
paradoxical  but  disastrous,  if  not  impossible.  Yet,  in  so 
far  as  we  can  judge  of  it,  up  to  a  recent  period,  it  has  been 
successful. 

And  this  success  has  been  largely  due  to  the  very  circum- 
stances which  might  have  seemed  the  most  discouraging. 
Between  the  years  1820  and  1906  we  received  more  than 
24,000,000  foreign  immigrants,  who  with  their  descendants 
to-day  undoubtedly  constitute  much  the  larger  half  of  our 
75,000,000  white  population.  A  few  of  these  people  came 
with  the  advantages  of  education,  and  a  few  with  property. 


60     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

But  these  were  rare  exceptions.  There  were  many  farmers 
and  skilled  workmen,  but  the  vast  majority  were  from  the 
humble  ranks  of  European  laborers.  They  were  ignorant, 
like  the  general  class  from  which  they  had  come,  and  many 
of  them  were  in  other  respects  ill-conditioned. 

We  learned  by  degrees  to  enforce  certain  minimum  stand- 
ards in  order  to  protect  ourselves  against  the  arrival  of 
notorious  criminals,  habitual  paupers,  and  those  mani- 
festly belonging  to  the  dependent,  defective,  and  delinquent 
classes.  But,  otherwise,  the  doors  were  wide  open.  The 
very  fact  that  the  immigrants  were  ignorant  and  poor,  - 
that  they  had  no  pride  of  ancestry  and  no  memory  of  for- 
tunate conditions  at  home,  — made  it  the  easier  for  them 
to  accept  the  conditions  of  a  new  country  and  to  cherish 
great  hopes  for  their  children.  They  came  at  a  time  when 
we  were  building  railroads,  creating  industrial  and  manu- 
facturing centers,  and  rearranging  our  population  by  a 
twofold  movement,  — one  to  the  commercial  and  manufac- 
turing towns  and  one  to  the  new  lands  of  the  West.  They 
found  here  an  ample  reward  for  industry  and  thrift,  and  were 
willing  to  enter  our  industrial  school  in  the  lowest  class,  so 
to  speak.  This  gave  us  opportunity  for  a  much  more  rapid 
development  of  complex  economic  life  than  would  other- 
wise have  been  possible. 

For  a  good  while  the  Germans  engaged  in  a  variety  of 
humble  callings,  and  the  Irish  supplied  the  demand  for 
unskilled  manual  labor.  The  older  American  element  found 
an  increased  opportunity  for  leadership  and  direction  in 
business,  social,  and  political  life.  In  the  midst  of  these 
changing  conditions,  there  remained  a  sufficient  social  and 
economic  mobility  to  prevent  the  formation  of  class  lines 
or  race  groups.  The  farm-hand  could  learn  farming,  save 


PROBLEMS  OF  POPULATION  AND  CITIZENSHIP          61 

money,  and  reasonably  hope  to  become  a  landowner.  If 
the  wage-earner  in  mill  or  factory  or  mine  could  not  well 
expect  to  change  his  own  occupation  for  the  better,  he  could 
center  his  hopes  in  his  children. 

The  public  schools  became  more  than  ever  the  essential 
institution  of  the  country.  However  imperfect  their  meth- 
ods of  teaching,  they  were  at  least  making  it  certain  that 
the  children  of  all  classes  of  immigrants  would  adopt  the 
English  language,  reading  and  writing  it  as  well  as  speak- 
ing it,  and  would  acquire  the  American  point  of  view. 

If  these  immigrants  had  come  to  us  in  association  with 
a  great  number  of  men  of  wealth  and  high  intelligence 
from  their  own  countries,  they  would  almost  inevitably 
have  been  drawn  into  geographical  groups,  where  they 
would  have  perpetuated  their  own  languages  and  customs. 
They  would  not  merely  have  introduced  new  racial  ele- 
ments, but  they  would  have  altered  the  social  structure. 
Wisconsin  would  have  become  a  permanently  German  State, 
like  portions  of  southern  Brazil.  We  should  have  had 
Italian  elements  retaining  their  own  language  and  charac- 
teristics, like  the  Italians  of  Argentina.  Minnesota  would 
have  become  Swedish,  and  the  Dakotas  Norwegian. 

Our  experiment  hitherto  has  shown  us  the  transform- 
ing power  of  democratic  institutions  and  ideals  under  fa- 
vorable conditions.  It  does  not  follow,  however,  that  the 
incidental  evils  and  difficulties  of  what  in  the  main  has  been 
a  fortunate  and  successful  movement,  may  not  grow  until 
they  require,  not  merely  ordinary  remedies,  but  also  sharp 
preventive  checks.  Time  and  experience  alone  can  tell 
us.  It  unquestionably  remains  the  general  intention  of  the 
American  people  to  adhere-  to  their  old  views  regarding 
the  essential  solidarity  of  American  citizenship. 


Ill 


FURTHER  REMARKS  UPON  IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUES- 
TIONS, WITH  PARTICULAR  REFERENCE  TO  THE  SOUTH- 
ERN PROBLEM 

FROM  the  beginning  we  had  carefully  guarded  the  prin- 
ciple of  free  migration  within  our  own  territories.  And, 
although  we  did  not  express  the  principle  in  a  formal  way, 
we  also  cherished  the  idea  that  this  country  should  always 
afford  free  asylum  to  those  who  chose  to  come  here  because 
of  religious,  or  civic,  or  econoniic  disadvantage  in  Europe. 
So  deep-rooted  was  this  idea,  that  even  those  extreme 
Protestants  who  formed  the  Know-nothing  party  in  the 
fifties,  to  check  the  growing  power  of  the  Irish  Catholics, 
had  no  more  thought  of  putting  restrictions  upon  immigra- 
tion than  of  limiting  the  freedom  of  movement  from  one 
state  to  another. 

It  was  not  until  the  influx  of  Chinese  labor  on  the 
Pacific  coast  became  very  large  that  the  doctrine  of  uni- 
versal asylum  was  brought  into  serious  dispute.  Laborers  in 
great  numbers  were  needed  for  building  the  Pacific  rail- 
roads and  other  tasks  of  Pacific  coast  development.  Fewer 
than  one  hundred  thousand  Chinese  laborers  had  been 
imported  before  1870,  but  in  the  following  years  the  num- 
ber increased  with  great  rapidity.  American  workmen 
contended  that  the  very  essence  of  our  institutions  de- 
pended upon  the  maintenance  of  our  accustomed  standards 
of  living.  They  argued  that,  with  sources  of  supply  so 

62 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  63 

vast,  Chinese  labor  threatened  not  merely  to  disturb  eco- 
nomic conditions  temporarily,  but  to  change  permanently 
the  social  character  of  the  Pacific  coast  states. 

It  is  needless  to  rehearse  the  now  familiar  facts  and 
arguments.  I  wish  only  to  recall  certain  points  of  view. 
The  issues  of  the  war  and  the  controversies  of  Reconstruc- 
tion politics  had  intensified  the  New  England  view  of 
human  rights  as  such;  and  to  deny  the  Chinese  the  right 
of  free  access  to  this  country  seemed  like  a  base  betrayal 
of  a  sacred  cause  which  had  triumphed  in  the  emancipation 
and  enfranchisement  of  the  negroes. 

But  the  saner  and  more  logical  view  carried  the  day. 
If  the  presence  of  the  negro  in  a  great  democratic  brother- 
hood of  white  men  had  proved  so  divisive,  and  had  wrought 
such  incalculable  mischief,  with  endless  trouble  yet  in 
store,  why  should  we  run  the  risk  of  adding  to  our  future 
troubles  by  admitting  a  large  Mongolian  population  to 
the  Pacific  coast,  which  would  of  necessity  remain  alien 
and  distinct  ? 

At  length,  in  1879,  Congress  passed  a  bill  limiting  the 
number  of  Chinese  who  could  be  brought  to  the  United 
States  in  any  one  vessel,  to  fifteen.  President  Hayes 
vetoed  it  because  of  its  violation  of  treaty  obligations. 
After  due  negotiation  with  China,  another  bill  was  passed 
in  1882,  suspending  the  admission  of  Chinese  laborers  for 
ten  years.  And  that  suspension  has  been  extended  from 
time  to  time.  The  period  was  a  critical  one,  and  the  action 
taken  was  opportune.  Chinese  labor  served  a  temporary 
purpose  of  importance;  but  if  the  preventive  check  had 
not  been  applied  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago,  it  is  reasonably 
probable  that  by  this  time  conditions  would  have  been 
beyond  practical  remedy.  White  labor  would  have  avoided 


64    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

the  Pacific  coast,  just  as  it  avoided  our  Southern  states  in 
the  slavery  period.  And  the  recent  economic  develop- 
ments of  Oregon,  Washington,  and  California,  as  well  as  of 
a  series  of  states  and  territories  adjacent  to  these,  would 
have  been  dependent  upon  ever  increasing  relays  of  Asiatic 
labor. 

It  is  wholly  probable  that  by  this  time  the  Chinese  would 
have  outnumbered  the  white  population  of  our  states  west 
of  the  Rocky  Mountains.  Meanwhile  their  groups  and  colo- 
nies would  have  steadily  increased  in  our  Eastern  cities, 
and  every  population  center  would  have  had  its  Chinatown, 
with  all  attendant  features.  I  am  firmly  of  the  opinion 
that  the  Chinese  exclusion  act  was  of  inestimable  impor- 
tance, from  the  standpoint  of  our  original  American  pur- 
pose to  create  and  maintain  a  great  unified  nationality. 
In  excluding  the  Chinese  laborers,  we  decided  rightly  a 
constructive  problem  of  great  magnitude,  and  kept  the 
Pacific  coast  for  our  own  citizenship. 

More  recently,  the  Pacific  coast  has  been  stirred  up  over 
the  increase  of  Japanese  immigration.  The  demand  for  labor 
is  great,  and  the  existing  rule  of  exclusion  has  not  applied 
to  any  Asiatics  except  Chinese.  The  influx  of  Japanese 
had  not  as  yet  reached  such  dimensions  as  to  be  alarming, 
although  it  had  increased  of  late.  The  Japanese  govern- 
ment understood  the  spirit  of  our  policy,  and  was  seeking  to 
utilize  the  expansive  and  migratory  energy  of  its  people 
for  the  development  of  territories  under  its  own  control 
in  Asia,  especially  Korea.  Thus  it  prefers  to  check 
the  movement  of  Japanese  labor  to  the  United  States. 
If,  however,  such  a  check  should  not  be  put  into  effective 
operation,  and  the  stream  of  Japanese  immigration  should 
greatly  increase  in  volume,  it  is  by  no  means  unlikely 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  65 

that  the  arguments  which  led  to  the  exclusion  of  Chinese 
labor  twenty-five  years  ago  would  prevail  as  against  im- 
migration from  other  Asiatic  countries.  Meanwhile,  a  prac- 
tical way  to  reduce  the  incoming  of  Japanese  laborers  was 
found  by  President  Roosevelt  and  Secretary  Root  early  in 
1907  by  a  passport  regulation.  Its  chief  significance  lay 
in  the  fundamental  policy  of  exclusion  that  undoubtedly 
inspired  it. 

As  respects  the  desirability  of  putting  a  radical  check 
upon  the  volume  of  European  immigration  now  arriving, 
it  is  difficult  to  view  the  question  with  any  sort  of  perspec- 
tive. In  times  past  when  rapid  influx  might  have  suggested 
limitation,  natural  causes  have  so  suddenly  reduced  the 
swollen  stream  as  to  dismiss  the  question  in  its  immediate 
aspects.  It  is  to  be  remembered  that  present  tests  keep 
back  great  numbers  whom  the  steamship  companies  decline 
to  receive  at  points  of  origin. 

If  the  test  of  literacy  were  added,  we  should  further 
reduce  the  present  movement  by  perhaps  30  per  cent. 
Yet  the  illiterates  come  from  disadvantaged  regions,  rather 
than  from  exceptionally  degraded  classes.  Our  labor 
market  absorbs  them,  and  their  children  enter  the  schools. 
The  illiterates  show  no  peculiar  criminal  or  anti-social 
tendencies.  If  their  lack  of  intelligence  unfits  them  for 
anything,  it  is  for  the  political  franchise.  An  obvious 
remedy  would  lie  in  the  direction  of  our  attaching  much 
greater  importance  to  the  process  of  naturalization,  and 
restricting  the  franchise,  in  the  case  of  the  foreign-born, 
to  those  showing  positive  fitness  for  participation  in  our 
political  and  governmental  life. 

The  inconveniences  due  to  the  massing  of  new  popu- 
lation elements  in  our  great  cities  will  probably  prove  to 


66    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

be  transitional.  They  put  the  greater  burden  on  our  public 
schools,  and  they  give  opportunity  to  the  corruptionist  and 
the  demagogue  in  politics.  The  English  language  remains 
our  great  necessary  bond.  Our  Constitution  and  our  laws 
are  written  in  that  language,  and  it  would  be  absolutely 
reasonable  to  admit  no  foreign-born  citizen  to  the  franchise 
who  cannot  read  the  laws  in  the  language  of  this  country. 
The  more  polyglot  the  newer  immigration  becomes,  the 
more  reasonable  and  desirable  is  an  insistence  upon  the 
common  use  for  public  purposes  of  one  language. 

Whether  or  not  we  find  it  desirable  to  adopt  any  sweeping 
form  of  restriction  upon  the  freedom  of  honest  working 
people  to  make  their  homes  in  this  country,  we  shall  con- 
tinue undoubtedly  to  extend  and  to  perfect  the  existing 
forms  of  regulation.  We  shall  have  better  inspection  and 
sifting  at  the  points  of  embarkation.  We  shall  greatly 
increase  our  efforts  to  promote  a  better  distribution  of 
immigrants  throughout  the  country.  We  shall  encourage 
the  renewed  efforts  of  Southern  and  Western  states  to  divert 
immigrant  population  from  the  Eastern  cities.  We  shall 
watch  with  extreme  interest  the  experiments  which  are 
soon  to  test  thoroughly  the  newer  forms  of  demand  for 
European  labor  in  the  Southern  states. 

In  spite  of  the  difficulties  caused  by  his  presence,  the  Sou  th- 
em states  have  upon  the  whole  accorded  to  the  negro  the 
amplest  opportunities  in  economic  directions.  He  is  not 
only  permitted  .but  encouraged  to  own  land,  and  all  occu- 
pations are  open  to  him.  There  is  no  working  class  in 
any  European  country  possessing  a  tithe  of  the  advantages 
that  are  at  the  hand  of  the  negro  working  class  of  our 
Southern  states.  Their  leaders  have  failed  to  perceive 
this,  with  a  few  exceptions.  From  this  time  forth  the 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  67 

negro  will  be  subjected  to  a  new  and  increasingly  severe 
competition  with  white  labor  of  recent  European  origin. 

If  the  negro  cannot  meet  this  test,  he  will  gradually  lose 
relative  position.  Negro  slavery  was  destroyed  by  Irish 
and  German  immigrants,  who  became  a  makeweight  that 
gave  the  North  and  West  an  irresistible  preponderance. 
The  ultimate  solution  of  the  negro  question  in  its  more 
recent  phases  will  probably  come  about  through  the  diver- 
sion of  European  immigration  to  Southern  states.  Of 
the  twenty-four  millions  who  have  come  here  since  1820 
very  few  have  gone  into  the  area  of  the  old  slave  states. 
They  have  entered  into  the  complex  industrial  and  agri- 
cultural development  of  the  North  and  West.  The  South 
has  remained  agricultural  and  has  made  limited  de- 
mands upon  the  world's  labor  market.  But  it  is  entering 
upon  a  new  industrial  period,  and  it  will  undoubtedly 
secure  great  accessions  of  European-born  workmen.  The 
new  competition  will  be  good  for  the  negro,  because 
it  will  result  in  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  although  it 
will  restrict  the  relative  growth  of  negro  population.  It  is 
the  most  interesting  of  our  future  problems. 

The  negro  race  question  in  some  of  its  relations  to  politi- 
cal parties  is  one  to  which  I  shall  have  to  recur  in  a  subse- 
quent chapter.  I  am  here  and  now  discussing  problems  of 
population  and  race  in  their  more  fundamental  aspects.  I 
have  endeavored  to  show  that  from  the  very  beginning  it 
has  been  the  object  of  the  American  people,  organized  as  a 
state  in  the  large  sense  of  that  word,  to  develop  a  unified 
nationality.  The  carrying  out  of  this  great  object  could 
only  have  been  accomplished  by  positive  political  action. 
It  required  the  national  extension  of  domain  in  order  that 
contiguous  unoccupied  territory  might  be  developed  upon 


68    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

a  uniform  plan  of  American  institutional  life,  and  with  a 
population  essentially  homogeneous. 

I  have  shown  briefly  how  the  problems  presented  by  the 
existence  here  of  aboriginal  Indian  tribes  —  problems  that 
seemed  so  formidable  to  our  forefathers  —  have  been 
gradually  overcome  until  their  final  solution  can  be  readily 
foreseen.  I  have  tried  to  point  out  the  significance  of  the 
arrival  here  before  and  after  the  Civil  War  period  of  great 
bodies  of  Irishmen  and  Germans  who  have  become,  in 
their  younger  generations,  so  assimilated  with  the  older 
American  population,  as  to  have  disappeared  from  the  dis- 
tinct place  they  held  for  a  time  in  our  political  life.  Some 
differentiation  of  tradition  is  a  desirable  thing  in  any  nation, 
for  it  gives  color  and  variety  to  life;  and  long  may  St. 
Patrick's  Day  be  remembered  and  observed  in  America. 
But  Mr.  Redmond  finds  here  a  younger  generation  of  sons 
of  Ireland  who  are  quite  ignorant  of  the  present  phases  of 
Irish  politics,  and  almost  hopelessly  indifferent  to  them, 
while  intensely  alive  to  the  problems  of  this  country.  The 
younger  generation  of  German  ancestry,  moreover,  while 
keeping  alive  a  certain  tradition  of  distinctive  traits  and 
qualities,  is  losing  even  a  slight  acquaintance  with  the 
German  language. 

In  short,  the  descendants  of  the  great  German  migration 
to  this  country  in  the  period  from  1850  to  1880  are  now 
more  completely  Americanized  than  many  of  the  descend- 
ants of  the  Germans  who  settled  in  Pennsylvania  almost 
two  hundred  years  ago,  because  drawn  into  the  main  cur- 
rents of  the  national  life.  These  great  population  elements 
of  Irish  and  German  stock  are  too  deeply  engaged  with 
their  functions  in  the  economic,  social,  and  political  life 
of  America,  — these  functions  now  including  the  work  of 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  69 

Americanizing  the  new  hordes  of  Italians,  Hungarians, 
Poles,  and  Russians,  — to  maintain  those  distinctions  and 
prejudices  which  for  a  time  gave  us  German- Americans  and 
Irish- Americans,  as  factors  to  be  reckoned  with  in  our 
political  life.  It  may  be  added  that  in  like  manner  the 
Scandinavian-American  is  destined  soon  to  become  extinct. 
The  Scandinavians  of  the  Northwest  are  becoming  fully 
American  with  a  rapidity  of  assimilation  that  leaves  noth- 
ing to  be  desired. 

These  processes  of  transition  are  critical,  somewhat  in 
the  measure  of  the  contrasts  to  be  overcome.  Some  tem- 
porary evils  are  not  to  be  wholly  avoided.  We  are  careful, 
indeed,  to  exclude  so  far  as  possible  the  coming  of  criminals 
from  European  countries.  But  speaking  generally,  our 
criminal  elements  have  not  been  so  much  recruited  from 
the  ranks  of  immigrants  themselves  as  it  is  customary  to 
believe.  The  criminal  recruits  have,  rather,  come  from 
the  American-born  children  of  immigrants,  and  they  have 
spent  some  years  in  our  public  schools.  It  is  a  passing 
phase,  due  to  natural  difficulties  of  adjustment. 

This  fact  relates  to  a  very  important  and  fundamental 
problem  of  our  present  public  life.  From  the  early  days 
in  this  country,  in  whatever  terms  we  may  have  expressed 
it,  we  have  recognized  the  fact  that  the  permanence  of  our 
institutions  depended,  not  upon  the  forms  of  our  written 
constitutions  and  laws,  but  upon  the  transmission  of  our 
best  ideals  from  one  generation  to  the  next.  In  the  early 
days  this  preeminent  task  of  turning  the  younger  genera- 
tion into  Americans  was  shared,  with  the  school,  by  the 
home,  the  church,  and  various  institutions  of  neighbor- 
hood life.  The  stupendous  influx  of  foreign  elements,  and 
the  positive  decline  in  the  birth-rate  of  the  older  American 


70     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

stock,  has  now  changed  and  intensified  the  problem  of 
maintaining  American  standards  and  ideals.  During  the 
transitional  periods  a  greatly  increased  burden  of  responsi- 
bility must  rest  upon  the  public  schools. 

Prevailing  standards  of  American  life  are  much  higher 
in  most  respects  than  those 'of  the  European  laborers  and 
peasants  who  make  up  the  great  part  of  our  more  recent 
immigration.  The  arriving  adults  enter  honestly  and  hope- 
fully into  our  industrial  life.  Whatever  problems  of  an 
acute  or  immediate  sort  their  arrival  in  large  numbers  may 
present,  the  continuing  and  serious  problem  is  that  which 
looks  to  the  next  generation.  These  arriving  laborers 
cannot  themselves  dominate  the  country  or  very  seriously 
disturb  its  public  condition.  Their  labor  assists  in  our 
development  and  enrichment.  Their  ignorance  often  leads 
to  their  political  exploitation  by  demagogues.  But  this 
belongs,  again,  to  those  passing  phases  of  political  life  that, 
though  often  acute,  are  superficial  and  transient. 

The  deep  and  abiding  problem  is  that  of  the  transforma- 
tion of  the  Scandinavian,  or  Italian,  or  Polish  child  into  an 
American  citizen  as  firmly  loyal  to  our  ideals  and  as  capable 
of  doing  a  citizen's  part  as  if  his  ancestors  had  lived  in  this 
-country  for  four  generations  under  favorable  conditions. 
Fortunately,  the  opportunities  afforded  by  American  life 
still  have  their  power  to  kindle  the  imagination  of  the  new- 
comers. They  soon  find  that  they  have  everything  to  gain 
and  nothing  to  lose  by  a  complete  merging  into  the  life  of 
this  country.  This  hopeful  receptivity  on  the  part  of  the 
immigrant  has  only  to  be  met  by  wise  plans  and  provisions 
on  our  part  for  his  full  adoption  into  the  American  family. 

If  we  find  that  the  process  of  assimilation  is  not  seriously 
disturbed,  there  would  seem  no  sufficient  reason  for  attempt- 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  71 

ing  to  place  severe  and  arbitrary  restrictions  upon  the  flow 
of  European  immigrants  to  our  shores.  The  fact  that  our 
industrial  activities  have  readily  absorbed  the  new  labor 
supply  of  the  past  decade  would  not  permanently  justify 
so  huge  a  volume  of  immigration  unless  it  were  reasonably 
certain  that  these  strange  people  would  cease  to  be  alien 
and  would  in  due  time  become  merged  and  blended  and 
altogether  American. 

Heretofore,  as  I  have  said,  our  European  accessions  have 
come  in  periods  bearing  some  relation  to  our  waves  of 
business  prosperity.  This  was  true  of  the  great  migration 
that  reached  its  climax  in  1854.  It  was  similarly  true  of 
that  which  set  in  after  the  Civil  War  and  attained  its 
maximum  in  1873.  The  next  year  of  climax  was  in  1882, 
which  brought  us  nearly  800,000  immigrants.  This  was 
five  or  six  times  as  many  as  came  in  1877  or  1878.  It 
is  true  that  the  average  from  1903  to  1907  has  been 
about  a  million  a  year.  But  from  1894  to  1899  the 
average  was  only  a  quarter  of  a  million.  The  changes  of 
this  human  tide  come  with  startling  abruptness ;  and  while 
we  are  discussing  ways  and  means  to  prevent  a  complete 
inundation,  the  situation  is  likely  enough  to  alter  of  itself, 
so  that;  instead  of  a  million  a  year,  we  may  be  receiving  a 
half  or  a  quarter  of  that  number. 

It  would  probably  be  advantageous  if  the  graphic  line 
that  indicates  these  changes  were  less  violent  in  its  fluctua- 
tion. A  steadying  and  an  equalizing  of  the  current  of 
migration  would  be  beneficial.  It  is,  of  course,  to  be 
remembered  that  all  checks  are  expected  to  operate  at 
the  point  of  origin,  so  that  the  disqualified  would  suffer 
no  hardship  from  rejection.  Tests  should  therefore  be  of 
a  simple  kind,  easy  to  understand.  The  idea  that  adult 


72     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

immigrants  should  know  how  to  read  and  write  their  own 
language  and  should  have  a  small  amount  of  property  is 
not  unreasonable  in  itself,  and  might  in  times  of  prosper- 
ity operate  rather  desirably  than  otherwise.  For,  in  the 
seasons  of  maximum  influx,  the  limit  is  fixed  by  the 
capacity  of  the  steamships.  If  tests  of  education  and  prop- 
erty were  established,  immigration  would  still  be  very  large 
in  periods  of  great  demand  for  labor.  Another  method 
of  equalizing  and  somewhat  limiting  immigration  is  found 
in  the  tendency  to  require  a  larger  cubic  air  space  for  each 
person  in  the  steerage  of  ships.  And  along  a  similar  line 
is  the  proposal  to  fix  the  maximum  number  which  any 
ship  may  bring  at  one  time.  The  new  immigration  law  of 
1907  requires  more  ship  space,  and  in  other  ways  extends 
the  oversight  of  the  government. 

It  is  possible  by  regulations  of  one  kind  or  another  to 
retard  somewhat  the  inflow,  and  to  discriminate  somewhat 
in  favor  of  the  more  intelligent  and  thrifty  as  against  those 
who  in  Europe  always  live  close  to  the  pauper  line.  But 
all  the  burden  of  proof  thus  far  must  rest  with  those  who 
assert  that  harsh  and  severe  restrictions  are  necessary. 
So  long  as  our  labor  market  can  make  good  use  of  the 
arriving  adults,  while  our  school-teachers  report  that  their 
efforts  —  together  with  the  other  assimilating  forces  of 
American  life  —  can  mold  the  children  into  a  safe  and 
responsible  type  of  American  citizenship,  we  have  no  cause 
for  grave  apprehension. 

The  structure  of  our  political  life  is  such,  thanks  to  the 
foresight  of  the  founders  of  the  Republic,  that  we  have  been 
able  thus  far  to  receive  foreigners  into  our  citizenship  with- 
out detriment.  And  the  structure  of  our  economic  and 
industrial  life  is  such  in  its  variety  and  complexity  that  we 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  73 

have  been  able  to  utilize  all  classes  of  foreign  labor  without 
impairing  freedom  of  movement  and  change.  We  are  not 
hardening  our  population  into  classes  or  castes  or  groups, 
whether  of  different  trades  or  callings,  or  of  different 
nationalities.  The  Italian,  coming  now  in  the  twentieth 
century,  finds  the  same  freedom  of  opportunity  that  the 
German  or  Irishman  found  half  a  century  earlier.  He 
begins  as  a  common  laborer  at  excellent  wages,  finds  pro- 
motion in  certain  special  callings,  whether  as  a  cobbler  of 
shoes  or  a  dealer  in  fruit,  and  moves  easily  and  readily 
forward  in  every  line  of  craftsmanship  or  trade  or  pro- 
fessional pursuit.  Such  is  the  process;  and  without  undue 
optimism  I  am  bound  to  say  that  it  seems  entirely  safe 
and  wholesome. 

Even  to  the  complaint  that  of  the  recent  newcomers  the 
great  majority  are  at  present  retained  in  the  East,  and  add 
to  the  foreign  character  of  our  larger  cities,  there  are  hopeful 
answers  to  be  made.  First,  these  cities  are  the  centers  of 
certain  forms  of  industry  that  give  the  newcomers  immedi- 
ate employment  and  a  safe  introduction  to  American  life  in 
close  contact  with  many  earlier  comers  of  their  own  na- 
tionality. The  forces  of  attrition  and  assimilation  in  a 
metropolis  like  New  York  are  very  great..  From  the 
necessities  of  the  case  the  public  schools  of  such  a  city 
recognize  and  accept  the  function  of  training  foreign  chil- 
dren to  be  Americans.  If  one  were  searching  for  a  pre- 
eminent focus  of  patriotic  American  enthusiasm,  he  would 
find  nothing  to  answer  that  description  more  satisfactorily 
than  a  representative  public  school  of  New  York  or  Chicago, 
where  more  than  90  per  cent  of  the  children  are  of  non- 
English-speaking  foreign  parentage. 

From  the  beginning  the  Americans  have  been  a  composite 


74      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

European  race,  and  we  must  reconcile  ourselves  to  the  idea 
that  the  earlier  stock  is  to  be  superseded  by  the  later.  The 
French  race  in  France  holds  its  own  in  numbers.  It  gains 
a  very  little,  by  absorption  of  a  few  immigrants  from  Italy 
and  other  Latinic  peoples.  But  the  early  American  stock 
east  of  the  Alleghanies  and  north  of  Virginia  does  not  thus 
hold  its  own.  We  are  witnessing  a  veritable  transformation 
of  the  American  people,  so  far  as  race  and  stock  are  con- 
cerned. But  through  it  all,  American  life  seems  to  have 
more,  rather  than  less,  of  its  old  power  to  assimilate  the 
newcomer.  The  public  schools  and  the  contacts  of  the 
playground,  the  street,  and  the  shop  give  all  children  the 
fluent  use  of  the  English  language,  and  the  newspapers  do 
the  rest. 

The  hundreds  or  thousands  of  papers  printed  here  in 
other  languages  merely  serve  the  convenience  of  the  first 
generation  of  newcomers.  They  are  useful  in  their  way, 
because  they  give  knowledge  of  American  institutions  and 
life  to  naturalized  citizens  in  the  only  language  they  have 
learned  to  read.  But  from  the  larger  standpoint  they  are 
transient  and  negligible.  The  second  generation  reads 
English  by  preference,  and  the  third  generation  is  unable 
to  read  anything  else. 

While,  therefore,  the  whole  great  tendency  is  just  what 
should  be  desired,  and  precisely  in  keeping  with  the  hopes 
and  aims  of  the  founders  of  the  country,  it  follows  none  the 
less  that  there  are  many  problems  of  serious  importance 
growing  out  of  this  unprecedented  task  of  assimilation; 
and  these  problems  are  to  be  dealt  with  in  the  course  of 
the  day's  work.  Education  under  these  circumstances 
becomes  the  foremost  task  of  enlightened  statesmanship. 
Not  only  must  schools  be  universally  provided  at  whatever 


__~J.     J-_ 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  75 


cost  to  the  public  treasury,  but  the  best  thought  of  the 
country  must  concern  itself  to  see  that  the  schools  employ 
the  right  means  to  reach  the  desired  ends.  For  the  schools 
no  longer  exist  principally  to  impart  instruction  in  the  art 
of  reading,  or  in  arithmetic,  or  in  geography,  thus  merely 
supplementing  the  work  that  was  done  for  the  child  in  the 
home  life  of  our  earlier  American  society,  —  but  the  schools 
exist  nowadays  to  perpetuate  the  elements  of  American 
life,  and  to  maintain  its  ideals  and  its  traditions. 

Moreover,  this  work  of  assimilating  new  elements  of 
population,  on  so  vast  a  scale,  justifies  and  requires  special 
social  and  public  movements,  such  as  that  for  the  preven- 
tion of  the  employment  of  young  children  in  factories  and 
mines.  In  earlier  periods,  the  state  could  safely  neglect 
some  forms  of  social  control  and  oversight.  It  could  tax 
the  community  to  provide  the  public  school,  while  leaving 
it  entirely  to  the  discretion  of  parents  whether  or  not  their 
children  should  attend.  And  in  like  manner  it  could  leave 
the  industrial  employment  of  children  without  public  regu- 
lation. But  under  these  newer  conditions,  while  the  state 
may  endure  the  burdens  and  the  difficulties  thrown  upon 
it  by  the  presence  here  of  millions  of  adults  of  little  or  no 
education,  of  slight  acquaintance  with  our  language,  and 
of  no  fitness  or  aptitude  for  the  political  life  to  which  we  so 
readily  admit  them,  it  is  plain  enough  that  such  conditions 
are  endured  because  they  are  considered  transient,  and  that 
the  state  cannot  and  will  not  permit  them  to  become  per- 
petuated or  intensified  through  neglect  of  the  children. 

It  belongs,  therefore,  to  a  sound  program  of  constructive 
politics,  first,  to  provide  ample  school  facilities  for  all  chil- 
dren; second,  to  see  that  the  schools  have  such  a  character 
as  to  train  children  for  American  citizenship  and  for  useful 


76     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVEVOPMENT 

places  in  the  economic  life;  third,  to  see  that  all  children 
are  actually  taught  and  trained,  directly  or  indirectly, 
under  the  auspices  of  the  state ;  and  fourth,  as  a  necessary 
corollary,  to  prevent  parents  and  employers  from  depriv- 
ing children  of  their  rightful  opportunities  of  instruction 
and  training.  This  program  is  a  very  large  one,  and  its 
urgency  cannot  fairly  be  questioned. 

Hitherto  it  has  been  deemed  sufficient  to  leave  both  the 
expense  and  the  control  of  this  work  of  elementary  educa- 
tion to  the  respective  states,  —  although  this  remark  admits 
of  some  important  modifications.  From  the  very  begin- 
ning the  nation  itself  recognized  the  free  neighborhood 
school  as  one  of  the  foundation  stones  upon  which  its 
institutions  must  rest;  and  in  the  disposal  of  the  public 
lands,  the  national  government  —  presupposing  the  estab- 
lishment everywhere  of  such  free  school  systems  —  gave 
certain  sections  or  square  miles  in  every  township  toward 
the  creation  of  school  endowment  funds.  In  other  and 
analogous  ways,  the  nation  has  recognized  the  schools  as  an 
essential  of  American  life,  and  has  made  further  grants, 
usually  in  the  form  of  lands,  to  the  respective  states  for 
educational  purposes. 

The  conditions  of  life  in  the  South  before  the  Civil  War 
had  not  been  favorable  to  such  a  development  of  free  public 
schools  as  had  been  attained  in  the  North  and  West.  In 
the  period  following  the  war,  it  became  manifestly  necessary 
to  provide  schools  in  the  South,  and  prevailing  sentiment 
required  a  separate  system  for  negro  children.  In  the 
impoverished  condition  of  the  South,  it  was  manifestly 
impossible  to  make  suitable  provision  at  once  even  for  a 
single  system  of  common  schools,  and  the  added  expense 
of  a  double  system  meant  a  practical  failure  of  both.  The 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  77 

percentage  of  illiteracy  had  been  high  among  the  poorer 
white  people  of  the  South  before  the  war,  and  the  con- 
ditions that  existed  from  1860  to  1870  greatly  increased  this 
percentage.  A  wiser  and  more  philosophical  national 
statesmanship  in  the  period  from  1865  to  1885  would  have 
recognized  the  economic  and  social  rehabilitation  of  the 
South  as  the  most  important  of  the  nation's  public  duties. 

But  the  passions  and  prejudices  that  culminated  in  the 
great  war  were  destined  to  survive  for  a  long  time  in  the 
political  life  of  the  country.  The  North  had  not  only 
emancipated  the  Southern  negroes,  but  it  had  enfranchised 
them,  and  through  delay  in  the  granting  of  amnesty  to  the 
Southern  white  men,  it  had  for  a  time  placed  the  negroes  in 
political  control,  with  consequences  that  were  appallingly 
disastrous.  The  withdrawal  of  federal  troops  from  the 
Southern  states,  in  1877,  had  been  followed  by  the  immedi- 
ate exclusion  of  the  negroes  from  the  prominent  place  they 
had  assumed  in  politics  and  government  for  ten  years.  The 
processes  by  which  the  white  race  not  only  asserted  and 
gained  political  supremacy,  but  completely  excluded  negroes 
of  all  classes  from  participation  in  political  life,  were  more 
than  summary  and  drastic ;  they  were  revolutionary. 

The  negroes  had  been  enfranchised  without  any  train- 
ing to  fit  them  for  political  responsibilities.  Furthermore, 
they  were  arrayed  in  politics  as  one  solid,  numerical  factor 
against  everything  that  had  previously  constituted  the  po- 
litical structure  and  life  of  the  Southern  states.  It  was  not 
merely  an  unwise  situation,  but  it  was  unendurable,  and 
it  would  have  led  to  a  race  war  of  extermination,  if  white 
supremacy  had  not  been  able  to  assert  itself  when  once 
the  federal  hand  was  withdrawn.  Despite  their  losses  in 
the  Civil  War,  the  whites  were  about  twice  as  numerous  as 


78       POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

the  negroes  throughout  the  South  as  a  whole,  although  in 
South  Carolina  and  Mississippi  the  negroes  were  more 
numerous  than  the  whites. 

History  can  always  be  trusted  to  interpret  these  move- 
ments with  justice  and  without  passion.  But  it  is  not  easy 
for  contemporaries  or  participants  to  see  the  full  bearing  of 
political  events.  It  was  natural  that  the  Southern  race 
question  should  have  become  involved  in  party  contro- 
versy. The  granting  of  political  suffrage  to  the  emanci- 
pated negroes  followed  the  New  England  theory  of  abstract 
human  rights,  that  had  gained  strength  with  the  abolition 
movement,  and  it  also  appealed  to  the  Republican  leaders 
as  a  practical  political  measure.  If  the  Southern  states 
were  to  be  readmitted  to  their  places  in  the  Union,  it 
seemed  to  the  Northern  politicians  necessary  to  enfranchise 
the  negroes  as  a  preliminary,  by  amendment  of  the  national 
Constitution,  for  two  reasons :  first,  to  give  the  negroes 
themselves  a  political  and  legal  method  of  self-protection 
in  the  states  where  they  lived,  and,  second,  to  give  the 
nation  a  constitutional  method  by  which  in  future  case 
of  need  it  could  support  the  negroes  against  harsh  discrimi- 
nation and  could  also  control  federal  elections. 

The  great  historical  opportunity  had  come  to  make 
American  citizenship  national,  in  express  terms  of  the 
Constitution,  and  to  make  the  political  franchise  equal 
and  universal  throughout  the  country.  In  their  broad 
significance,  the  14th  and  15th  Amendments  added  to  the 
Constitution  those  very  principles,  as  respects  equality  of 
American  citizenship,  that  had  been  at  the  basis  of  the 
country's  entire  political  and  social  development. 

The  presence  of  the  negro  race  had  always  formed  the 
one  extreme  and  dangerous  exception.  The  prohibition 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  79 

of  the  slave-trade,  which  took  effect  in  1808,  must  be  re- 
garded not  merely  as  due  to  scruples  against  an  iniquitous 
traffic,  nor  alone  as  an  admission  of  the  fact  that  human 
slavery  was  objectionable,  but  must  also  be  regarded  as  a 
far-sighted  restriction  upon  immigration.  It  was  definitely 
intended  to  build  up  a  homogeneous  society  in  America, 
and  the  presence  of  great  numbers  of  negroes,  quite  apart 
from  their  status  as  slaves,  would  have  been  out  of  keeping 
with  such  aims  and  ideals. 

The  prohibition  of  the  slave-trade  was,  in  its  way,  the 
precursor  of  the  Chinese  Exclusion  Act  which  took  effect 
about  seventy-five  years  later.  Unfortunately,  the  laws 
against  the  slave-trade  were  imperfectly  enforced.  The 
growth  of  cotton  culture  and  the  plantation  demands  of  the 
South  made  the  smuggling  of  slave  cargoes  very  profitable 
and  tempting,  and  the  West  Indies  afforded  a  convenient 
rendezvous  for  this  illegal  traffic.  Nevertheless,  I  will 
venture  to  express  an  opinion,  perhaps  a  novel  one,  that  the 
prohibition  of  the  slave-trade  was  the  most  important  of 
all  public  acts  in  the  history  of  this  country,  from  the 
standpoint  of  constructive  policy  in  the  development  of  our 
citizenship.  For  in  spite  of  its  imperfect  enforcement,  this 
prohibition  made  the  slave-trade  outlawed,  piratical,  and 
extremely  hazardous,  and  in  the  main  it  was  successful  in 
its  object. 

So  great  became  the  later  demand  for  slave  labor  in  our 
Southern  states,  that  if  the  slave-trade  had  been  left  free 
and  open,  there  is  ample  reason  for  thinking  that  the  traffic 
from  Africa  direct,  from  the  West  Indies,  from  the  Turkish 
Empire,  and  from  all  parts  of  the  world  where  human  beings 
were  objects  of  barter  and  sale,  would  have  expanded  upon 
a  very  great  scale.  What  the  Constitution  politely  called 


80      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

"the  migration  or  importation  of  such  persons  as  any  of 
the  states  now  existing  shall  think  proper  to  admit" 
would  have  gone  on  with  ever  increasing  energy.  When 
the  New  England  sea  captains  had  to  give  up  the  slave-trade, 
they  brought  white  European  laborers  over  to  our  Northern 
ports  and  sold  them  in  the  open  markets  to  the  highest  bid- 
der for  a  term  of  years  as  the  method  of  collecting  their 
passage  money.  This  influx  of  white  people  to  the  North 
would  have  been  paralleled  or  outstripped  by  the  great 
influx  of  negroes  to  the  South. 

I  am  looking  at  the  race  problem  in  its  fundamental 
aspects.  Slavery  under  the  American  flag  was  bound  to 
be  self-limiting  and  temporary.  Its  abandonment  did 
not  depend  in  any  manner  upon  the  outbursts  of  anti- 
slavery  sentiment  in  the  North,  nor  upon  the  proclamation 
of  freedom  as  a  war  measure.  It  would  have  been  given 
up  in  due  time  as  an  obsolete  form  of  human  relationship. 
From  the  standpoint  of  the  longer  movements  of  history, 
the  important  thing  was  the  importation  of  large  numbers 
of  people  so  alien  in  origin  and  characteristics  as  the  negroes, 
irrespective  of  their  earlier  status.  And  the  virtual  end- 
ing of  this  form  of  immigration  in  1808  is  of  incalculable 
significance  to  the  subsequent  course  of  American  history. 
So  great  was  the  demand  for  more  negroes  in  the  forties 
and  fifties  that  the  repeal  of  the  law  of  1808  was  openly 
demanded  by  representatives  of  the  slave  power ;  and  in  the 
years  just  preceding  the  war  the  illicit  slave-trade  had 
undoubtedly  assumed  rather  large  dimensions. 

The  conditions  of  the  plantation  system  of  the  lower 
South  and  of  the  domestic  slave-trade  were  not  favorable 
to  a  very  rapid  increase  of  numbers.  There  were  about 
1,200,000  slaves  in  the  country  in  1810,  just  after  the 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  81 

suppression  of  the  slave-trade.  The  number  had  doubled 
by  1840,  and  it  reached  nearly  4,000,000  in  1860.  Since 
Southern  representation  in  Congress  allowed  three-fifths 
of  the  slaves  to  be  reckoned,  there  was  no  temptation  to 
make  the  census  figures  too  small.  I  do  not  hesitate  to 
express  the  belief  that  if  the  slave-trade  had  remained  open, 
there  would  have  been  at  least  twice  as  many  slaves  by 
the  census  of  1860,  and  probably  as  many  negroes  in  the 
country  then  as  there  are  now.  The  negro  population 
would  have  vastly  outnumbered  the  white  throughout  all 
the  lower  South,  and  the  outlook  for  the  future  would  have 
been  something  very  different  from  that  which  now 
exists. 

The  abolition  of  slavery  would  have  come,  but  it  is 
probable  that  a  number  of  the  great  states  of  the  South 
would  have  remained  permanently  negro  communities  like 
San  Domingo,  Haiti,  and  Jamaica.  The  social  difficulties 
that  pertain  to  the  Southern  race  situation  will  be  serious  for 
a  long  time  to  come.  But  it  is  probable  that  the  worst  of  the 
political  difficulties  have  now  been  met.  The  Constitution 
provides  for  a  national,  universal  citizenship  that  includes 
the  negroes,  and  these  provisions  will  stand.  Many  negroes 
have  come  North,  and  their  votes  count  in  the  balance 
between  parties.  The  great  necessity  of  the  South  was  to 
find  some  way  of  restoring  order  and  the  appearance  of 
legality,  while  putting  political  power  —  where  it  could 
best  be  exercised  —  in  the  hands  of  the  white  population 
during  the  period  needful  for  negro  training  and  develop- 
ment. Having  disfranchised  the  negro  first  by  intimida- 
tion and  fraud,  the  Southern  states,  with  only  one  or  two 
exceptions,  proceeded  to  disfranchise  him  by  enactments 
providing  educational  and  property  qualifications,  advance 


82      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

payment  of  poll  taxes,  and  various  discretionary  powers 
vested  in  registration  and  election  officers. 

Under  the  new  provisions  of  the  federal  Constitution 
it  is  required  that  representation  in  Congress  should  be 
reduced  m  proportion  to  the  number  of  citizens  excluded 
from  the  franchise  by  any  state.  This  mandate,  however, 
could  be  put  into  effect  only  by  acts  of  Congress  recogniz- 
ing the  facts  and  proceeding  accordingly.  But  although 
Republican  party  platforms  have  from  time  to  time  de- 
manded a  reduction  of  Southern  representation,  no  serious 
attention  has  been  given  to  the  subject  by  Congress,  and  it 
is  not  likely  that  any  steps  will  be  taken  to  reduce  Southern 
representation  in  the  new  apportionment  of  seats  in  the 
House  that  will  follow  the  census  of  1910. 

The  solution  as  it  stands  is  by  no  means  unstatesman- 
like.  Every  negro  citizen  of  the  United  States  retains 
his  theoretical  political  rights.  In  the  South  he  does  not 
at  present  exercise  those  rights  except  in  certain  districts  or 
communities,  such  as  eastern  Tennessee.  But,  meanwhile, 
the  negro  has  full  opportunity  to  educate  his  children,  and 
to  work  freely  and  securely  at  any  trade  or  calling.  The 
South  is  still  poor,  and  it  is  with  great  effort  and  sacrifice 
that  it  can  by  degrees  improve  its  very  imperfect  system  of 
elementary  education.  The  laws  of  the  Southern  states 
require  an  impartial  per  capita  division  of  school  funds 
between  the  two  races.  And  although  the  negro  schools 
do  not  in  all  cases  actually  receive  their  share  of  school 
money,  the  provision  made  for  negro  education  by  these 
states,  in  view  of  all  the  circumstances,  is  both  generous 
and  broad-minded.  Negro  illiteracy  is  gradually  dimin- 
ishing, and  economic  progress  is  clearly  perceptible.  In 
the  more  prosperous  cities  and  towns,  school  conditions 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  83 

have  greatly  improved  for  both  races  within  recent  years. 
By  degrees  there  will  develop  a  considerable  element  of 
conservative  negro  population,  possessing  intelligence, 
property,  and  character.  And  such  negroes  will  probably, 
by  common  consent,  come  into  actual  exercise  of  their  pres- 
ent theoretical  rights  as  citizens. 

The  North  has  gradually  learned  to  recognize  the  inherent 
difficulties  of  the  race  situation,  and  to  see  the  need  of 
allowing  the  Southern  states  to  work  out  their  own  prob- 
lems through  the  changes  that  can  only  come  about  with 
the  passing  of  the  years.  The  states  which  were  so  eager 
just  before  the  war  for  the  further  unrestricted  importation 
of  African  labor  are  now  beginning  to  exert  themselves  to 
secure  the  importation  of  Italian  and  other  elements  of 
European  white  labor. 

One  of  the  great  recent  constructive  policies  of  the 
United  States  government  has  been  directed  toward  the 
diversification  and  improvement  of  Southern  farming.  In 
Louisiana,  Texas,  and  other  Southern  states,  remarkable 
results  have  followed  the  scientific  and  practical  demon- 
strations of  the  Department  of  Agriculture.  While  there 
is  room  for  the  negro  in  this  improved  farming,  there  is  — 
even  more  importantly  — a  great  and  growing  opportunity 
for  the  white  man.  In  many  regions  where  the  plantation 
system  once  prevailed,  the  smaller  farms,  owned  and  suc- 
cessfully cultivated  by  white  farmers  of  the  Northern  type, 
are  multiplying  rapidly. 

Furthermore,  the  development  of  manufactures  through- 
out the  South  is  bringing  into  existence  the  complex  in- 
dustrial life  which  affords  opportunities  in  many  directions 
for  an  increased  population,  that  can  only  be  derived  from 
European  sources,  since  there  is  no  available  negro  supply, 


84     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

even  if  negroes  were  more  desirable  than  white  men.  The 
logic  of  the  situation  is  that  from  this  time  forth  the  white 
population  of  the  South  is  destined  to  grow  very  much  more 
rapidly  than  the  negro  population.  The  advance  of  indus- 
try, wealth,  and  population  will  improve  the  general  condi- 
tions of  social  and  political  life.  Schools  will  be  better 
supported,  and  the  disorders  illustrated  by  riots  and  lynch- 
ing will  diminish  as  industrial  society  becomes  more  ad- 
vanced, and  as  police  administration  is  more  thoroughly 
organized.  These  disorders  are,  indeed,  very  deplorable, 
and  they  must  be  contended  against  by  all  the  serious 
forces  of  politics  and  civilization.  But  it  is  philosophical 
to  view  them  as  transitional  in  their  nature. 

There  was  a  time  when  the  negro  population  of  the  United 
States  was  almost  20  per  cent  of  the  total.  This  percent- 
age has  been  gradually  diminishing  until  it  was  about 
11 J  in  the  year  1900.  If  the  present  rate  of  immigration 
should  continue,  the  negro  percentage  will  have  been 
reduced  in  the  census  of  1910  to  about  one- tenth  of  the 
whole  population. 

The  slavery  system  lifted  perhaps  one  million  Southern 
white  people  to  the  position  of  a  favored  class,  and  led  to 
the  neglect  and  relative  decline  of  the  South's  most  valuable 
possession,  namely,  its  five  or  six  millions  of  plain  white 
people  of  old  American  stock,  who  had  very  little  property 
and  few  advantages.  For  the  great  majority  of  the  four 
million  negroes,  slavery  meant  an  immeasurable  improve- 
ment in  their  lot,  when  compared  with  their  conditions 
in  Africa.  In  any  just  estimate,  the  disadvantaged  people 
—  for  whom  the  philanthropists  and  reformers  of  the  North 
should  have  lifted  up  their  voices  —  were  not  the  slaves, 
but  the  disinherited  and  neglected  mass  of  white  population. 


IMMIGRATION  AND  RACE  QUESTIONS  85 

It  is  slowly  dawning  upon  the  minds  of  the  political 
leaders  of  the  South  that  the  redemption  of  their  commu- 
nities lies  in  the  full  restoration  and  development  of  their 
own  white  population.  The  cotton-mill,  the  school,  the 
improvement  of  agriculture,  every  agency  of  progress  and 
civilization,  must  be  invoked  to  make  the  poor  whites  of 
the  South  prosperous  and  intelligent.  The  progress  that 
is  now  evident  along  all  these  lines  represents  the  most 
important  and  transforming  movement  in  American  society 
and  in  fundamental  conditions  that  the  new  century  can 
show.  The  economic  and  social  upbuilding  of  the  Southern 
white  population  will  bring  about  conditions  attractive 
to  white  immigrants  from  Europe  and  the  North,  and  the 
structure  of  Southern  society  will  by  degrees  come  to  be 
similar  to  that  of  other  regions  where  white  men  live  and 
work  on  a  high  level  of  intelligence  and  democratic  equality. 

The  negro  race  will  decline  steadily  in  relative  numbers, 
will  remain  socially  distinct,  and  will  be  greatly  improved 
by  the  sheer  necessities  of  a  situation  that  will  subject  it 
to  a  competitive  struggle  for  existence.  There  will  probably 
be  some  apparent  tendency  toward  concentration  of  negro 
population  in  the  so-called  "  Black  Belt"  and  other  districts 
for  a  time;  but  the  larger  tendency  will  be  toward  a  dis- 
persion of  the  race.  Thus  the  most  difficult  social  and 
political  situation  with  which  we  have  had  to  contend  in 
the  formative  process  of  building  up  our  continental  Amer- 
ican democracy  will  have  been  reduced  to  a  fairly  work- 
able solution,  by  the  resistless  dynamics  of  our  onward 
movement. 

We  had  acquired  a  vast,  favorable  domain;    we  had 

created  a  free  political  system;   we  had  opened  wide  our 

loors  to  the  kindred  nationalities  of  Europe,  and  the  result 


86      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

was  a  new,  composite  nationality,  with  unity  of  language, 
with  similarity  of  local  institutions,  with  pervasive  intelli- 
gence, with  social  and  industrial  mobility.  A  society  thus 
constituted  could  not  tolerate  the  disarrangements  that 
would  arise  from  a  large  Mongolian  influx  on  the  Pacific 
coast.  Nor  would  it  permit  large  fresh  accessions  of  negro 
population  from  the  West  Indies  or  directly  from  Africa. 
But  it  can  accept  the  burden  imposed  upon  it  through 
its  own  faults  and  errors  of  the  earlier  period.  It  can 
deal  justly  and  in  a  helpful  and  loyal  spirit  with  the  negroes 
already  here  and  with  their  children  after  them.  Their 
presence  will  continue  to  be  anomalous,  but  the  difficulties 
arising  from  it  will  grow  less  critical  and  less  baffling  from 
this  time  forth.  No  single  solution  of  a  magical  sort,  but 
a  host  of  less  perceptible  remedies  all  making  for  normal 
progress  and  national  unity,  will  by  degrees  bring  about  a 
condition  endurable  for  both  races. 


IV 


PROBLEMS   RELATING   TO   THE   SETTLEMENT   AND  USE   OF 
THE   NATIONAL   DOMAIN 

WHEN  the  nation  acquired  the  Western  lands  of  Virginia 
and  the  other  original  colonies,  it  also  assumed  their  Revo- 
lutionary War  debts.  From  the  standpoint  of  Alexander 
Hamilton  and  other  constructive  statesmen  of  that  period, 
the  assumption  of  the  debts  was  more  important  than  the 
acquisition  of  the  lands,  as  a  unifying  measure.  It  was 
indeed  expected  that  the  Western  settlements  would  develop 
rapidly,  and  bring  new  and  important  states  into  the 
Union,  but  the  men  charged  with  the  problems  of  finance 
naturally  thought  of  the  Western  lands  as  a  lucrative  asset 
and  expected  much  from  their  sales  in  large  tracts  as  a 
source  of  public  revenue. 

This  anticipation  was  never,  in  fact,  justified.  The 
public  lands  have  probably  cost  the  government  of  the 
United  States,  from  first  to  last,  $150,000,000  more  than 
they  have  brought  into  the  treasury.  It  was  realized  by 
degrees  that  the  public  domain  would  have  to  be  regarded 
as  virtually  free  to  those  who  were  willing  to  go  and  live 
upon  it  and  bear  their  share  in  overcoming  the  difficul- 
ties of  frontier  life.  The  land  laws  came  to  be  looked  upon  as 
providing  a  method  for  regularizing  the  occupation  of  the 
land  and  for  settling  conflicts  between  rival  claimants, 
rather  than  as  a  means  of  putting  money  into  the  national 

87 


88      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

exchequer.  Pioneers  and  so-called  " squatters"  were  con- 
stantly pressing  well  beyond  the  lines  of  the  surveyed  areas 
that  were  regularly  opened  to  sale  and  settlement,  and 
ways  were  almost  invariably  found  to  enable  these  fron- 
tiersmen, without  undue  hardship,  to  obtain  legal  title. 

Over  the  whole  face  of  the  land  there  was  extended  in 
legal  theory  a  form  of  ownership  vested  in  tribes  of  Indians. 
Before  the  government  could  regularly  survey  and  open  to 
sale  a  given  district,  the  Indian  title  had  to  be  extinguished 
through  a  treaty  made  with  the  chiefs  or  heads  of  the  occu- 
pying tribe,  which  treaty  in  turn  had  to  be  ratified  by  the 
tribe  itself  on  recommendation  of  the  chiefs.  This  process 
involved  in  each  case  an  arrangement  for  the  occupation 
of  other  lands  by  the  receding  tribe,  and  usually  a  consider- 
able money  payment  besides.  Thus,  in  the  aggregate,  very 
large  sums  of  money  were  paid  out  by  the  national  govern- 
ment in  order  to  open  the  lands  to  white  settlement. 

In  addition  there  were  the  costs  of  surveying  the  land 
and  of  administering  the  arrangements  for  its  orderly 
disposal.  While  no  comprehensive  system  was  at  first 
adopted,  the  successive  laws  and  rules  for  the  disposal  of 
fresh  areas  took  on  a  similarity  of  essential  features. 

Obviously,  it  was  not  to  the  advantage  of  new  states  and 
territories,  most  of  whose  lands  still  remained  a  part  of  the 
unsold  national  domain,  that  such  tracts  should  be  expen- 
sive or  difficult  to  acquire.  The  new  communities  were 
eager  for  population  and  development.  If  the  general 
government  had  held  its  land  at  a  high  price,  settlement 
would  have  proceeded  slowly.  As  a  question  in  purely 
speculative  politics,  it  would  be  interesting  to  consider 
what  might  have  happened  if  the  government  had  from 
the  outset  pursued  a  different  policy  with  regard  to  its 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN    89 

unoccupied  domain.  What  really  happened  was  the  adop- 
tion of  a  policy  that  made  the  public  lands  virtually  free 
in  comparatively  small  tracts  for  actual  settlers. 

By  degrees  there  came  to  be  attached  to  the  arable 
public  domain  the  conventional  price  of  $1.25  an  acre. 
This  was  to  be  looked  upon  as  the  settler's  share  toward 
extinguishing  the  Indian  title  and  toward  the  actual  ex- 
pense of  surveying  the  land  and  giving  him  a  recorded  and 
guaranteed  patent.  It  was  by  no  mere  accident,  or  through 
no  argument  for  convenience  in  designating  and  selling  the 
lands,  that  the  six-mile-square  township  was  adopted  as 
the  unit  of  land  measurement  when  Congress  first  began 
to  provide  for  distribution  of  its  domain  beyond  the  Ohio. 
The  very  name  " township"  was  expressive  of  the  expecta- 
tion that  these  surveyed  squares  of  wilderness  land  would 
in  due  time,  each  for  itself,  become  the  territorial  basis  for 
a  self -ordering  neighborhood  life.  The  township  contained 
thirty-six  sections,  or  square  miles,  and  the  quarter-section 
of  one  hundred  and  sixty  acres  came  in  due  time  to  be 
regarded  as  the  standard  or  average  for  the  extent  of  a 
single  farm  or  homestead. 

Thus  almost  from  the  beginning  the  doctrine  that  the 
public  lands  were  an  endowment  for  the  benefit  of  the 
national  treasury  was  abandoned.  A  very  different  theory 
took  its  place,  namely,  that  the  public  domain  was  to  be  care- 
fully prepared,  and  distributed  to  actual  settlers  on  terms 
so  favorable  as  to  encourage  a  rapid  Western  development. 
Methods  were  adopted  that  would  tend  to  keep  the  lands 
from  falling  into  the  hands  of  large  landed  proprietors,  and 
would,  on  the  contrary,  distribute  them  to  farmers  who 
would  build  up  their  own  equal  democratic  commu- 
nities, while  clearing  the  forests,  making  their  homes,  and 


90      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

creating  their  estates.  This  idea  that  Uncle  Sam  had  land 
enough  to  give  everybody  a  farm  who  would  live  upon  it 
and  occupy  it,  appealed  very  strongly  to  the  imagination 
of  the  country  in  the  middle  part  of  the  last  century.  It 
played  a  greater  part  in  the  development  of  our  social  and 
political  life  than  is  generally  remembered. 

It  was  not,  however,  a  view  that  was  welcome  to  the 
slave  power  of  the  South,  because  it  had  a  tendency  to 
build  up  the  free  farming  states  of  the  West  more  rapidly 
than  the  slave  system  could  grow  in  its  southwesterly 
empire.  The  Louisiana  Purchase,  as  it  turned  out,  had 
done  far  more  to  extend  the  system  of  free  farming  that 
had  become  standardized  in  the  settlement  of  Ohio,  Indiana, 
and  Illinois,  than  to  give  new  room  for  the  expansion  of 
slavery.  This  vast  domain  purchased  from  Napoleon  was 
wedge-shaped,  with  the  narrow  end  touching  the  Gulf  of 
Mexico.  All  that  slavery  obtained  from  it  was  comprised 
in  the  area  of  the  present  states  of  Louisiana,  Arkansas, 
and  Missouri.  Iowa,  Minnesota,  Nebraska,  and  all  that 
lay  west  and  north  of  these  were  successfully  claimed 
for  the  free  farming  system  of  the  old  Northwest.  The 
destiny  of  Kansas  was  in  doubt  for  a  time,  but  the  superior 
colonizing  energy  of  the  free  farmers  carried  the  day  under 
the  squatter-sovereignty  struggle  of  the  late  fifties. 

It  is  true  that  the  demand  for  additional  slave  territory 
had  helped  to  secure  the  annexation  of  Texas;  but  this 
annexation  had  brought  on  the  war  with  Mexico,  which  in 
its  turn  had  led  to  the  acquisition  of  California.  And  the 
discovery  of  gold  on  the  Pacific  coast  had  "brought  about 
conditions  of  settlement  that  precluded  the  slave  system. 
Thus  California  was  admitted  to  the  Union  without  having 
gone  through  the  probationary  period  of  a  territorial 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN      91 

government ;  and  as  Texas  had  come  in  with  slavery  as  a 
preexisting  system,  so  California  was  admitted  under  its 
own  constitution  of  1849,  forever  prohibiting  slavery. 

Meanwhile,  our  title  to  the  Oregon  country  had  been 
confirmed,  and  a  territorial  government  had  been  erected 
in  1848,  under  conditions  in  every  way  favorable  to  the 
settlement  there,  as  in  California,  of  free  farmers  upon  the 
great  public  domain.  Even  before  this  time  the  govern- 
ment had  adopted  the  practice  of  granting  two  square 
miles  in  each  surveyed  township  to  the  new  state  or  ter- 
ritory for  a  permanent  endowment  of  common  schools. 
Thus  in  spirit  and  in  practical  working,  the  land  policy 
of  the  United  States  had  been  designed  to  create  free 
agricultural  commonwealths  in  the  Mississippi  Valley  and 
farther  west;  and  their  progress  had  obtained  such  head- 
way and  momentum  before  the  land  hunger  of  the  slavery 
system  had  become  insatiate,  that  a  preponderance  had 
been  obtained  beyond  all  chance  of  reversal. 

It  was  this  policy  of  public  domain,  in  conjunction  with 
our  immigration  policy  and  those  conditions  in  Europe  that 
had  sent  us  millions  of  Irishmen  and  Germans  previous  to 
1860,  that  preserved  the  country  for  its  original  ideals  of  a 
free  and  homogeneous  democracy.  Such,  however,  was 
the  strength  of  the  compact  influence  of  the  pro-slavery 
elements  in  Congress,  that  it  had  never  been  possible  to 
enact  the  broad,  free  homestead  legislation  for  the  whole 
public  domain  that  had  been  strongly  advocated  for  many 
years  in  the  North  and  West. 

Such  legislation  quickly  followed  the  withdrawal  of  the 
Southern  states  from  the  Union.  The  land  legislation  of 
1862  stands  as  a  great  monument  in  the  history  of  Ameri- 
development.  While  still  permitting  the  native  or 


92       POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

naturalized  citizen  through  actual  occupancy  to  obtain  title 
to  one  hundred  and  sixty  acres  of  the  public  domain  after 
a  limited  period  of  residence  and  the  payment  of  $1.25  an 
acre  (a  system  adopted  in  1841),  it  further  provided  that 
the  permanent  homesteader  who  had  built  his  house  and 
cultivated  his  land  in  good  faith,  might  at  the  end  of  five 
years  obtain  full  and  free  title  to  his  quarter-section  farm 
without  payment  of  the  $200  or  any  other  sum  whatsoever. 

Under  these  liberal  provisions,  with  some  further  addi- 
tions and  modifications  of  the  land  system,  the  great 
Western  prairies  were  settled  as  if  by  magic,  when,  at  the 
end  of  the  Civil  War,  the  awakened  energies  of  the  nation 
were  turned  toward  economic  development.  The  restless 
energy  of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  young  soldiers  from 
the  Confederate  as  well  as  from  the  Union  armies  found 
an  outlet  in  the  opportunity  to  go  westward.  The  new 
land  laws  facilitated  the  most  rapid  possible  settlement. 
The  movement  was  further  stimulated  by  an  era  of  unpre- 
cedented railroad  building,  the  new  lines  radiating  in  all 
directions  from  central  Western  points  like  Chicago  and 
St.  Louis. 

Almost  from  the  moment  of  gold  discovery  in  Cali- 
fornia, there  had  been  a  widespread  agitation  and  dis- 
cussion of  the  possibility  of  overland  railways  to  unite 
the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  coasts.  Several  routes  were  pro- 
jected and  partially  surveyed  in  the  decade  before  the 
Civil  War.  It  was  proposed  to  secure  the  construction  of 
such  roads  through  the  granting  of  broad  belts  of  public 
land,  which  would  become  valuable  by  reason  of  the  means 
of  access  which  the  railroads  would  provide. 

Throughout  all  the  Western  states  in  the  thirties  and 
forties  there  had  been  a  wild  speculative  furor  for  quick 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN      93 

growth  and  aggrandizement.  Billions  of  dollars'  worth  of 
canals  and  railroads  had  been  projected  on  paper,  and  all 
forms  of  subsidy  and  public  aid  had  become  thoroughly 
familiar.  The  Western  states  as  a  rule  had  pledged  their 
credit  freely  for  the  promotion  of  such  new  ways  of  com- 
munication, counties  had  issued  bonds  to  secure  railroads, 
townships  and  villages  had  subscribed,  and  Congress  in  a 
number  of  instances  had  conferred  favors  upon  particular 
Western  states  by  giving  lands  to  promote  transportation 
enterprises. 

Excessive  enthusiasm  for  such  undertakings  had  been 
largely  responsible  for  the  reaction  that  culminated  in  the 
panics  of  1837  and  1857.  In  the  settlement  of  a  new 
country,  speculation  is  inevitable.  It  is  one  phase  of  that 
buoyant  optimism  without  which  such  difficulties  as  have 
been  faced  in  the  subduing  of  our  American  continent 
would  have  been  prohibitive. 

In  the  outbursts  of  titanic  energy  necessary  to  the  rapid 
opening  up  of  the  West,  followed  by  successive  periods 
of  inevitable  reaction,  have  been  born  very  many  of  the 
political  problems  and  controversies  which  have  been  pe- 
culiar to  the  life  of  the  American  people  and  which  have 
marked  the  course  of  our  political  and  economic  history. 
The  South,  which  had  not  been  favorable  to  a  national 
free  homestead  policy,  had  also  been  consistently  adverse 
to  the  development  of  the  West  through  a  policy  of  land 
subventions  to  transportation  companies.  New  York  had 
built  her  own  Erie  Canal ;  and  other  enterprises  for  linking 
the  East  with  the  West  had  simply  grasped  at  whatever 
aid  they  could  secure,  whether  national,  state,  or  local. 
But  the  breaking  out  of  the  war  had  emphasized  the  isola- 
tion of  our  Pacific  coast  country,  and  a  Congress  without 


94      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Southern  members  and  with  a  great  Republican  majority 
was  ready  promptly  to  subsidize  not  one  transcontinental 
road  merely,  but  as  many  as  could  bring  forward  serious 
claims  to  consideration. 

The  first  to  offer  were  the  UnioiiJEacific,  building  westward 
from  Omaha,  and  the  Central  Pacific,  building  eastward 
from  Sacramento  to  meet  this  Omaha  line.  Congress 
granted  these  companies  great  loans  in  the  form  of  gold 
bonds,  and  gave  them  some  thirty  million  acres  of  land  in 
addition.  Their  activity  was  further  stimulated  by  an 
arrangement  which  left  the  point  of  meeting  indefinite, 
and  based  the  amounts  of  land  and  money  subsidy  upon 
mileage  of  construction  actually  achieved.  This  method 
resulted  in  the  completion  of  a  transcontinental  line  in 
seven  years,  whereas  twice  as  long  a  period  under  other 
conditions  would  have  been  required. 

The  high  pressure,  however,  of  such  efforts  —  pressure 
financial  and  political  as  well  —  centered  upon  our  public 
life  at  Washington,  with  results  that  blasted  reputations 
and  that  helped  to  make  honesty  in  public  life  itself  a 
political  issue  embarrassing  to  our  self-respect  but  too 
serious  to  be  disregarded  or  covered  up. 

This,  however,  from  the  larger  view  of  history  making, 
was  only  an  incident.  The  building  of  the  Pacific  rail- 
roads and  the  lending  of  government  credit,  together  with 
the  use  of  railroad  companies  for  inducing  migration  and 
distributing  public  land,  were  great  substantive  acts  of 
public  policy,  magnificent  in  the  largeness  of  their  con- 
ception and,  upon  the  whole,  splendid  and  beneficent  in 
their  working  out.  The  land  grants  to  the  Union  and 
Central  Pacific  systems  were  followed  by  even  more  ex- 
tensive grants  to  the  Northern  Pacific  and  to  the  Southern 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN      95 

Pacific,  not  to  mention  the  great  grant  to  the  Atlantic 
and  Pacific,  and  still  other  assignments  of  domain  along 
the  same  policy. 

It  was  carefully  arranged  that,  in  the  distribution  of 
these  lands,  the  homestead  principle  should  be  followed  in 
so  far  as  possible.  In  the  aggregate,  the  grants  to  railroads  I 
reached  something  like  two  hundred  million  acres.  These  / 
lands,  however,  were  not  given  in  continuous  tracts,  but// 
in  alternate  square  miles.  Those  not  familiar  with  this 
colossal  phase  of  the  history  of  our  nation-making  will 
understand  it  if  they  have  in  mind  any  given  township  or 
six-mile-square  tract  falling  within  the  zone  of  a  railroad 
land  grant.  Eighteen  of  the  thirty-six  sections  were  assigned 
to  the  railroad  company  on  an  alternate  checkerboard 
plan.  Of  the  remaining  eighteen  sections,  two  were  set 
aside  for  the  benefit  of  the  local  school  fund,  and  sixteen 
were  further  subdivided  into  four  quarter-sections  of  one 
hundred  and  sixty  acres  each,  to  be  open  to  settlement 
under  the  preemption  and  homestead  laws. 

This  method  gave  the  government  the  opportunity  of 
locating  its  homesteaders  in  the  general  belt  served  by  a 
railroad  line,  while  on  the  other  hand  it  practically  com- 
pelled the  railroad  to  dispose  of  its  lands  in  competition 
with  the  government,  and  made  it  certain  that  the  bringing 
of  population  and  settling  of  the  country  would  be  the 
governing  motive.  Thus  the  railroads  became  colonizers 
and  immigration  agents  on  a  great  scale.  The  rapid  set- 
tlement of  the  western  half  of  the  Mississippi  Valley  in 
the  twenty  years  following  the  war  lay  at  the  foundation 
of  many  problems  which  have  had  great  significance  in  our 
public  life,  and  some  of  which  I  must  present  more  par- 
ticularly in  subsequent  chapters. 


96      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Much  of  this  territory  rapidly  settled  was  an  open  prairie 
country  of  rich  soil  and  favorable  climate,  susceptible  of 
very  quick  agricultural  utilization  under  two  important 
conditions,  namely,  that  it  be  provided  with  railroads  and 
with  the  capital  necessary  for  farm  operations.  It  was  a 
country  that  could  not  be  quickly  developed  without  rail- 
roads to  bring  in  the  lumber  necessary  for  building  and  the 
fuel  necessary  for  winter  use,  besides  manufactured  sup- 
plies of  all  kinds.  On  the  other  hand  the  roads  were 
equally  necessary  to  transport  the  cereals  and  other  farm 
products,  that  were  destined  for  Eastern  and  European 
markets.  It  was  under  these  conditions  that  the  problem 
of  railroad  control  had  its  origin  in  this  country.  A  full 
understanding  of  the  railroad  question  in  our  American 
political  life  has  required  the  preliminary  consideration 
of  these  problems  of  population  and  of  domain,  which 
have  thus  far  occupied  our  attention. 

Furthermore,  as  I  have  remarked,  the  rapid  develop- 
ment of  Western  agriculture  required  capital.  A  very 
small  percentage  of  families  which  settled  upon  the  public 
domain  had  means  sufficient  for  more  than  a  rude  pioneer- 
ing start.  In  order  to  farm  advantageously,  it  was  needful 
to  have  buildings,  fences,  implements,  and  live  stock. 
Surplus  capital  from  the  East  and  from  Europe  was  drawn 
westward  by  high  rates  of  interest  and  the  assurance  that 
farm  mortgages  were  a  safe  kind  of  investment.  Within 
a  comparatively  short  period,  an  area  which  had  been 
unoccupied,  save  for  roving  bands  of  Indians  and  herds  of 
buffalo,  became  a  factor  in  the  production  of  the  world's 
supply  of  food.  Several  hundred  millions  of  bushels  of 
cereals,  each  year,  were  moving  eastward  to  compete  with 
the  farm  products  of  the  older  states,  or  to  be  shipped  to 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN      97 

Europe.  Every  country  in  the  world  was  profoundly 
affected. 

Farming  became  unprofitable  in  the  East,  and  this  fact 
stimulated  the  flow  of  population  westward.  The  cheapen- 
ing of  food  products  hopelessly  deranged  the  relations 
between  landlord  and  tenant  in  Ireland,  created  violent 
agrarian  troubles,  and  increased  the  exodus  from  the  Brit- 
ish Islands  to  America.  On  the 'European  continent,  the 
effect  of  American  competition  in  supplies  of  bread  and 
meat  was  so  depressing  that  it  similarly  increased  the  out- 
ward flow  of  population,  while  leading  to  the  erection  of 
anti-American  tariff  walls.  As  for  our  new  West  itself, 
it  could  not  wholly  escape  the  pains  and  penalties  of 
world-wide  economic  readjustment.  Its  free  lands  and 
rich  soil  brought  new  people  constantly  from  the  older 
agricultural  regions  which  had  suffered  from  the  new 
competition. 

Thus  the  West  became  the  victim  of  its  own  over-pro- 
duction. In  bountiful  years,  prices  were  so  low  that  the 
cost  of  railroad  transportation  became  vital,  and  part  of 
the  corn  crop  had  to  be  burned  for  fuel.  In  years  of 
drouth  or  excessive  rainfall,  of  grasshopper  scourge,  or  other 
visitation  of  nature,  it  was  impossible  to  pay  interest  upon 
the  universal  ten  per  cent  mortgage.  These  conditions 
were  making  themselves  felt  in  the  period  after  the  war, 
when  the  country  was  endeavoring  to  resume  specie  pay- 
ment. It  was  under  similar  conditions  that  the  great  silver 
movement  of  more  recent  years  had  its  strength,  if  not 
its  origin. 

When  vast  regions  of  a  country  are  in  the  process  of  ma- 
turing a  new  agricultural  and  industrial  life,  through  the  use 
of  capital  borrowed  from  other  regions,  questions  of  money 


98      POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

and  currency  come  to  have  an  almost  lif e- and-death  im- 
portance, if  crops  are  bad  and  prices  are  low  for  a  series  of 
years.  For  the  payment  of  interest  and  the  repayment  of 
principal  become  practically  impossible;  and  the  ques- 
tion is  bound  to  arise  whether  the  purchasing  power  of  the 
nominal  unit  of  value  has  in  any  manner  been  materially 
changed  since  the  contract  between  debtor  and  creditor 
had  been  originally  made.  Thus  the  problems  of  money, 
currency,  and  banking,  which  have  played  so  striking 
and  peculiar  a  part  in  American  political  life,  have  arisen 
through  the  sectional  differences  of  economic  condition 
brought  about  by  our  rapid  westward  movement. 

The  European  countries  had  within  a  hundred  years 
passed  through  the  rapid  stages  of  economic  development 
which  have  quadrupled  their  populations  and  changed 
them  from  old-time  farming  conditions  to  their  present 
intense  and  complex  industrial  life.  But  they  have  not 
been  troubled  by  questions  of  money  and  currency,  as 
great  popular  issues.  It  has  remained  for  the  United  States 
to  take  the  abstractions  of  monetary  science,  and  the 
technical  forms  of  knowledge  and  erudition  that  belong  to 
public  and  private  banking  systems,  and  make  them  the 
subject  of  political  debate  and  passionate  controversy  in 
every  village  and  every  country  school  district  throughout 
the  land.  It  has  all  been  a  part  of  a  valuable  training 
in  democratic  self-government,  and  it  has  had  a  profound 
effect  upon  the  character  and  course  of  our  political  life. 

The  emergence  of  such  issues  in  our  politics  has  been 
solely  due  to  the  conditions  of  population  and  of  domain 
which  I  have  been  endeavoring  to  describe.  The  necessity 
of  dealing  with  such  questions  explains  something  that  has 
puzzled  the  foreign  student  of  our  American  system  and 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN      99 

that  has  not  been  always  sufficiently  clear  to  our  own 
philosophers.  This  necessity  has  had  results  so  far-reach- 
ing that  I  may  be  pardoned  for  a  brief  digression  to  dwell 
for  a  moment  upon  the  significance  of  it. 

In  England,  it  would  not  be  considered  possible  at  any 
given  moment  to  name  more  than  a  handful  of  men  capable 
of  dealing  effectively  upon  short  notice  with  the  problems 
that  belong  to  the  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer.  Yet 
the  problems  that  present  themselves  for  consideration  to 
the  American  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  have  a  much 
wider  range  than  those  that  must  usually  be  faced  by  a 
European  finance  minister.  Where  a  hundred  men  in  some 
countries  might  be  regarded  as  students  of  the  varied 
theoretical  and  practical  problems  of  money  and  currency, 
as  related  to  public  and  private  finance,  we  have  many 
thousands  in  the  United  States  who  have  arrived  at  con- 
victions upon  almost  every  important  phase  of  those 
abstruse  and  technical  matters. 

Let  it  be  granted  that  most  of  these  people  have  read 
and  thought  superficially  and  crudely.  Nevertheless  we 
have  a  vast  number  of  citizens  who  have  been  accustomed 
through  many  years  to  bring  minds  of  great  strength  and 
ingenuity  to  bear  upon  the  study  of  such  questions. 
They  have  felt  it  necessary  for  them  to  understand  a 
series  of  subjects  that  in  European  countries  are  relegated 
to  experts,  and  that  even  statesmen  and  men  of  affairs  do 
not  as  a  rule  trench  upon,  regarding  them  as  they  might 
think  of  certain  abstruse  questions  of  mathematics  or 
astronomy. 

It  is  impossible  to  understand  truly  the  course  of  Ameri- 
can politics  until  one  has  to  some  extent  grasped  the  con- 
ditions under  which  practical  necessity  has  affected  the 


100    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

training  and  intelligence  of  our  citizenship.  While  it  is 
natural  enough  that  the  drift  of  opinion  through  great 
regions  of  country  should  in  the  main  coincide  with  self- 
interest,  it  is  notably  true  that  the  very  strength  of  political 
controversy,  when  such  questions  have  been  brought  into 
our  politics,  has  been  due  to  the  fact  that  on  both  sides 
essential  justice  has  been  considered  the  issue. 

In  their  earlier  periods,  the  Western  states,  however 
diverse  their  elements  of  population,  were  simple  in  their 
economic  and  social  structure,  and  rested  wholly  upon 
the  basis  of  agriculture.  While  more  devoid  than  any 
other  equally  prosperous  communities  in  the  world  of  a 
class  of  capitalists,  or  owners  of  realized  wealth,  they 
were  on  the  other  hand  more  free  than  any  other  com- 
munities of  importance  from  the  presence  of  a  non- 
possessing  or  servile  class.  We  had  succeeded  beyond  the 
dreams  of  the  most  sanguine  in  creating  on  our  arable 
lands,  under  the  homestead  system,  communities  —  as  in 
Iowa,  Kansas,  Nebraska,  Minnesota,  the  Dakotas  —  of 
average  similarity  of  status.  They  were  communities  of 
a  lower  percentage  of  illiteracy  than  any  others,  and  were 
more  susceptible,  probably,  than  any  others  to  the  play  of 
public  opinion. 

fhe  conditions  of  life  had  given  the  slaveholding  plant- 
ers of  the  South  a  training  and  an  aptitude  for  politics  that 
had  been  highly  conspicuous  through  the  period  before 
the  Civil  War.  And  in  turn,  the  conditions  of  Western 
farm  settlement  and  life  had  for  different  reasons  built  up 
a  series  of  communities  which  trained  themselves  to  a 
zest  and  an  aptitude  for  political  questions  and  public  life 
on  the  national  plane.  This  must  be  appreciated  in  order 
to  obtain  a  fair  understanding  of  our  political  life  since 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN    l(fl 

the  year  1870.  In  due  time  these  sensitive,  responsive, 
high-spirited  populations  that  settled  the  arable  states  of 
the  West  after  the  Civil  War,  brought  their  communities 
up  to  a  level  of  relative  maturity.  They  had  paid  off  their 
mortgages  and  had  begun  to  develop  a  more  varied  in- 
dustrial life.  The  free  lands  of  the  arable  Middle  West 
had  been  disposed  of,  and  the  homestead  and  land  system 
of  the  period  following  the  war  had  been  successful  in 
its  main  objects. 

It  was  well  known,  from  the  earliest  periods  of  explora- 
tion, that  a  wide  stretch  of  country  lying  to  the  east  of  the 
Rocky  Mountains  was  of  limited  rainfall,  and  that  a  part 
of  it  was  so  arid  as  virtually  to  constitute  a  desert  region. 
But  there  was  such  variation  of  rainfall  and  of  natural 
vegetation  in  different  years  that  it  required  a  generation 
of  experiment,  part  of  it  extremely  painful  and  disillusion- 
izing, to  learn  what  were  our  real  economic  problems  of 
domain  throughout  a  region  several  hundred  miles  in  width 
and  extending  from  the  Canadian  line  to  the  Mexican  bor- 
ders. The  period  of  rapid  settlement  in  the  Dakotas, 
Nebraska,  and  Kansas  happened  to  coincide  with  a  decade 
of  unusually  abundant  rainfall.  Thus  the  margin  of  settle- 
ment on  the  homestead  plan  was  pushed  beyond  the  line 
of  permanent  safety.  A  succession  of  dry  seasons  drove 
back  hundreds  of  thousands  of  settlers  and  destroyed  not 
only  a  long  north-and-south  belt  of  homesteads,  but  also 
brought  ruin  and  desertion  to  many  flourishing  railroad 
towns. 

It  was  learned  that  the  semi-arid  zone,  while  unsafe  for 
standard  American  farming,  was  fairly  well  adapted  to 
grazing.  Thus  a  vast  area,  covering  from  a  quarter  to  a 
third  of  the  whole  territory  of  the  United  States,  came  to 


POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

be  regarded  as  suitable  chiefly  for  cattle  and  sheep  ranches. 
This  condition  was  found  to  apply  to  the  western  parts  of 
the  states  I  have  named,  —  the  Dakotas,  Nebraska,  and 
Kansas,  —  and  it  pertained  also  to  Montana,  Idaho, 
Wyoming,  parts  of  Washington  and  California,  Utah,  parts 
of  Colorado  and  Nevada,  New  Mexico,  and  Arizona,  as  well 
as  a  great  part  of  Texas.  A  reaction  had  followed  the 
undue  optimism  of  those  who  attempted  to  pursue  ordinary 
farming  in  the  areas  of  doubtful  rainfall.  Later  in  turn 
a  serious  reaction  followed  the  speculative  development  of 
cattle  ranching,  where  limited  pasturage  was  easily  ex- 
hausted, watercourses  were  few  and  far  between,  and 
winter  conditions  often  extremely  severe. 

In  due  time  it  came  to  be  perceived  that  the  old  land  laws 
did  not  properly  apply  to  the  vast  region  of  insufficient 
rainfall  In  the  arid  and  semi-arid  belt,  the  water-supply 
is  the  chief  public  asset.  The  system  of  rectangular  sur- 
vey of  public  lands  in  townships  and  sections  and  quarter- 
sections,  and  their  absolute  disposal  under  the  preemption 
and  homestead  acts,  which  was  admirable  for  a  state  like 
Iowa,  did  not  suit  the  conditions  of  a  state  lying  in  the 
grazing  belt.  Those  who  were  fortunate  enough  to  locate 
their  claims  upon  the  watercourses  were  in  a  position  to 
command  for  grazing  purposes  all  the  land  that  extended 
behind  them  for  a  considerable  distance.  It  was  perceived 
too  late  that  the  lands  in  the  arid  states  should  have  been 
surveyed  upon  a  different  principle,  the  government  retain- 
ing control  of  the  watercourses,  in  order  to  give  the  holders 
of  land  on  either  side,  to  the  utmost  extent  practicable,  their 
reasonable  use  of  the  necessary  water. 

Since  conditions  favored  the  cattle  business  on  a  large 
scale,  rather  than  the  system  known  as  "  stock-farming  " 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN    103 

on  the  smaller  scale,  the  cattle  companies  were  tempted  to 
resort  to  various  devices,  some  of  them  manifestly  fraudu- 
lent, in  order  to  obtain  a  monopoly  of  streams  and  water- 
ways, and  thus  to  command  the  undisputed  control  of  a 
great  range  of  grazing  hinterland  for  their  flocks  and  herds. 
Meanwhile  it  was  discovered  by  degrees  that  the  arid  lands 
were  extremely  productive  where  brought  under  irrigation. 
Gradually  in  California,  and  to  a  smaller  degree  in  other 
states,  private  individuals  and  companies  obtained  control 
of  local  water-supplies  and  demonstrated  the  possibilities 
of  irrigation  farming  and  fruit  culture. 

The  states  themselves  were  disposed  to  engage  in  such 
experiments,  and  to  that  end  Congress  granted  a  million 
acres  of  the  arid  public  domain  to  each  of  these  Western 
states  in  the  year  1894.  With  much  friction  there  was 
gradually  coming  about  an  adjustment  of  conditions  among 
the  great  cattle  producers,  the  homesteading  farmers,  the 
irrigation  companies,  and  the  other  diverse  interests  of  a 
vast  empire  containing  more  than  a  million  square  miles. 
In  every  one  of  the  states  concerned  there  had  grown  up 
a  code  of  laws  and  regulations  based  upon  the  public  im- 
portance and  necessity  of  water.  Political  and  social 
problems  wholly  different  from  those  of  the  arable  and 
well-watered  portions  of  the  Mississippi  Valley  were  being 
worked  out  by  several  million  people  of  a  highly  energetic 
character,  scattered  throughout  a  great  country  which 
they  were  endeavoring  to  redeem  and  utilize. 

The  greater  part  of  the  lands  of  these  states  and  terri- 
tories remained  undisposed  of,  and  under  control  of  the 
national  government.  The  public  lands  thus  remaining 
included  not  only  the  unwatered  stretches  of  sage-brush 
plains,  but  the  mountainous  regions,  with  their  upland 


104    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

belts  of  open  timber  or  dense  forest,  including  the  head- 
waters of  the  streams  and  rivers.  Western  experience 
finally  crystallized  in  the  form  of  accepted  views  of  wise 
public  policy.  Trans-Mississippi  commercial  congresses, 
irrigation  conventions,  and  other  agencies  for  the  expres- 
sion of  Western  opinion  began  to  make  demands.  And 
although  the  country  could  not  accept  the  views  that 
for  a  time  prevailed  with  something  like  unanimity  in  those 
Western  communities  regarding  the  silver  question,  it 
began  to  see  the  justice  of  their  views  touching  certain 
problems  of  the  public  domain. 

Accordingly  there  was  adopted  the  principle  of  a  per- 
manent public  retention  of  the  chief  sources  of  water- 
supply,  and  in  place  of  the  old  subsidies  to  railroads  and 
other  government  measures  for  the  settlement  of  the 
prairie  states,  a  new  system  of  vast  importance  was  adopted 
by  virtue  of  the  so-called  Reclamation  Act  which  became 
a  law  in  June,  1902.  This  act,  which  bore  the  name  of 
Senator  Newlands  of  Nevada,  and  which  was  in  accord- 
ance with  the  most  extended  and  profound  of  the  recom- 
mendations contained  in  President  Roosevelt's  first  message 
to  Congress,  constitutes  one  of  those  great  culminating 
measures  in  the  course  of  our  constructive  politics,  that  it 
is  one  of  my  chief  purposes  in  these  pages  to  designate 
and  to  interpret. 

The  Reclamation  Act  itself  was  followed  by  an  effort  on 
the  part  of  the  existing  administration  to  bring  about  a 
thorough  revision  of  the  land  system  of  the  country,  in 
view  of  the  fact  that  the  remaining  public  lands  were  prac- 
tically all  in  the  arid  states.  President  Roosevelt,  in  his 
message  of  December,  1901,  had  summed  up  the  policy  he 
advocated  in  these  general  terms :  "  The  reclamation  and 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN    105 

settlement  of  the  arid  lands  will  enrich  every  portion  of 
our  country,  just  as  the  settlement  of  the  Ohio  and  Missis- 
sippi valleys  brought  prosperity  to  the  Atlantic  states. 
The  increased  demand  for  manufactured  articles  will  stimu- 
late industrial  production,  while  wider  home  markets  and 
the  trade  of  Asia  will  consume  the  larger  food  supplies  and 
effectually  prevent  Western  competition  with  Eastern  agri- 
culture. Indeed,  the  products  of  irrigation  will  be  con- 
sumed chiefly  in  upbuilding  local  centers  of  mining  and 
other  industries,  which  would  otherwise  not  come  into 
existence  at  all.  Our  people  as  a  whole  will  profit,  for  suc- 
cessful home-making  is  but  another  name  for  the  upbuild- 
ing of  the  nation." 

The  general  constructive  policy  of  the  President  called 
for  the  protection  of  the  Western  water-supply  by  the 
creation  of  forest  reserves,  and  the  actual  developing  of 
irrigation  farming  by  the  creation  of  governmental  irriga- 
tion works.  This  policy  of  national  investment  in  irriga- 
tion enterprises  was  so  radical  that  it  frightened  the 
Congressional  leaders  of  both  great  parties,  although  it 
had  found  expression  in  the  political  platforms  of  the  year 
1900.  The  Congressional  rank  and  file,  however,  had  been 
won  over  to  the  policy,  and  the  Reclamation  Act  was  car- 
ried as  a  non-partisan  measure  against  the  advice  and  the 
votes  of  the  more  conspicuous  lawmakers.  The  act  pro- 
vided that  the  proceeds  of  the  sale  of  public  lands  in  sixteen 
great  areas,  namely,  thirteen  states  and  three  territories, 
dating  from  June  30,  1901,  should  no  longer  go  into  the 
treasury  as  a  part  of  the  general  revenues,  but  should  be 
set  apart  for  irrigation  purposes. 

The  irrigated  lands  were  to  be  disposed  of  in  small  tracts 
to  actual  settlers-  at  a  price  large  enough  to  cover  fully  the 


106    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

cost  of  creating  and  maintaining  the  costly  engineering 
projects.  The  money  was  to  be  repaid  in  instalments  ex- 
tending over  a  period  of  ten  years  more  or  less.  The  sums 
thus  returned  to  the  Reclamation  Fund  would  be  applicable 
to  other  engineering  projects  for  further  reclamation,  and 
so  on. 

It  is  not  strange  that  conservative  statesmen  should  have 
looked  with  some  alarm  upon  so  striking  an  innovation. 
They  were  willing  to  encourage  the  states  and  territories 
in  the  local  promotion  of  irrigation  enterprise,  but  doubted 
the  wisdom  of  adopting  a  national  policy  of  irrigation. 
First,  they  foresaw  its  difficulties  from  th*e  standpoint  of 
practical  administration.  Second,  they  were  impressed 
with  the  argument  that  such  a  policy  involved  a  build- 
ing up  of  Western  agriculture  at  the  expense  of  the 
nation,  while  Eastern  agriculture  was  neglected  and  com- 
paratively unprofitable.  They  remembered  some  of  the 
more  immediate  disturbances  of  economic  balance  due  to 
the  policy  that  had  subsidized  railroads  and  in  every  man- 
ner hastened  the  upbuilding  of  the  so-called  granger  states 
of  the  Mississippi  Valley. 

They  failed  to  realize  that  the  new  reclamation  policy, 
in  the  very  nature  of  the  case,  could  not  operate  rapidly 
enough  to  bring  about  such  temporary  disturbances  of 
population  and  production,  while  from  every  standpoint  the 
development  of  the  arid  states  was  an  object  of  great  con- 
cern. A  number  of  these  states-  had  been  admitted  to  the 
Union  after  a  period  of  rapid  development  in  the  eighties 
which  had  created  expectations  that  were  wholly  unful- 
filled in  the  decade  following  1890.  These  so-called  cow- 
boy states,  with  their  scanty  population  and  undeveloped 
conditions,  had  acquired  an  influence  in  the  United  States 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN    107 

Senate  that,  when  compactly  exerted,  either  to  obstruct 
legislation  or  to  promote  it,  was  bringing  a  new  sectional 
force  into  our  governmental  affairs  that  was  neither  whole- 
some nor  normal  in  its  tendencies. 

The  remedy  for  such  a  condition  lay  in  the  development 
of  the  latent  resources  of  these  states  of  mountain  and 
desert,  whose  political  conditions  were  in  a  state  of  violent 
local  oscillation,  at  one  moment  exploited  by  cattle  "  kings, " 
mining  "  kings,"  and  railroad  "  magnates,"  at  the  next  by 
populist  orators,  desperadoes  in  guise  of  labor  leaders,  or 
political  demagogues.  The  Reclamation  Act  is  a  single 
feature  of  a  large  new  program  of  public  policy  for  the 
normal  and  permanent  development  of  these  mining  and 
grazing  states.  The  Geological  Survey  was  prepared  with- 
out delay  to  locate  the  initial  undertakings  and  to  direct  the 
service  of  reclamation.  These  first  projects  were  wisely 
distributed  throughout  all  the  states  and  territories  con- 
cerned ;  and  within  less  than  five  years  more  than 
$30,000,000  had  been  appropriated  for  projects  which 
when  completed  would  have  cost  more  than  $40,000,000. 

The  fund  will  steadily  increase  under  the  so-called  re- 
volving process,  and  it  will  in  future  be  applied  to  larger 
and  more  difficult  undertakings.  In  due  time  the  resources 
of  this  fund  will  justify  the  creation  of  a  series  of  dams  for 
the  storage  of  the  flood  waters  that  now  go  to  waste  in  the 
rainy  season.  The  land  capable  of  irrigation  is  of  unlimited 
extent,  and,  as  I  have  already  intimated,  the  problem  of  our 
Western  domain  is  not  a  problem  of  land,  but  a  problem  of 
water.  We  have  now  committed  ourselves  to  a  construc- 
tive internal  policy  which  would  not  have  been  possible  in 
the  earlier  period  of  the  Republic,  and  it  will  be  productive 
of  transforming  results.  In  that  earlier  period  we  created 


108    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

prosperous  democratic  communities  through  the  plan  of 
disposing  of  the  public  lands  to  settlers  in  quarter-section 
tracts.  In  the  arid  states  our  effort  to  dispose  of  lands 
under  those  same  laws  has  had  an  effect  opposite  to  that 
intended. 

Homesteads  by  the  hundreds  of  thousands  had  been 
located  fraudulently,  to  enable  corporations  and  syndicates 
to  control  watercourses  and  thus  to  monopolize  the  use  of 
vast  areas  of  the  public  domain.  The  desert  land  law, 
which  grants  six  hundred  and  forty  acres  to  one  person  for 
irrigation  purposes,  enacted  thirty  years  ago,  had  been  open 
to  similar  abuse.  A  complete  revision  of  the  land  system 
had  become  necessary  in  order  to  make  it  suit  in  a  scien- 
tific way  the  conditions  that  existed. 

It  is  to  be  remembered  that  throughout  the  states  of  the 
arid  or  grazing  belt,  the  greater  part  of  the  land  area  still 
belongs  to  the  United  States  government.  And  it  is 
probable  that  the  government  will  retain  permanently  the 
ownership  of  hundreds  of  millions  of  acres.  The  grazing 
lands,  which  the  great  cattle  companies  have  appropriated 
for  themselves,  and  which  they  have  parceled  out  by 
private  understandings  and  agreements,  with  the  indirect 
support  and  sanction  of  the  state  authorities  and  of  state 
laws  regulating  the  cattle  and  sheep  industries,  will  in 
due  time  have  been  brought  under  a  system  of  leasing. 

Some  million  of  acres  previously  granted  by  Congress  to 
the  individual  Western  states  are  thus  leased,  notably  in 
Colorado,  Montana,  Wyoming,  and  Utah.  The  extension 
of  irrigation  will  be  limited  simply  by  the  financial  and 
engineering  aspects  of  the  great  projects  of  the  reclamation 
policy  as  these  will  develop  in  the  future,  the  chief  object 
of  which  will  be  the  storage  of  water  in  the  forest  areas  of 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN    109 

the  mountain  slopes,  in  order  to  utilize  it  during  those  parts 
of  the  year  when  the  streams  naturally  run  dry.  With  this 
water  conserved  and  used,  the  sandy  desert  would  be  as 
productive  as  the  valley  of  the  Nile,  and  lands  now  worth 
nothing  more  than  a  rental  of  a  cent  or  two  an  acre  for 
cattle  ranges,  would  be  worth  a  thousand  dollars  an  acre 
for  agriculture. 

In  pursuance  of  this  broad  policy  of  public  use  of  the 
great  national  domain,  we  are  now  moving  far  more  rapidly 
than  most  people  are  aware  toward  a  complete  reversal 
of  our  old-time  land  system.  In  former  times,  it  was  the 
avowed  object  of  the  government  to  distribute  its  great 
domain  to  private  owners  as  rapidly  as  possible.  The  coun- 
try as  a  whole  was  well  wooded  and  its  forest  resources  were 
deemed  inexhaustible.  The  public  ownership  and  adminis- 
tration of  forests,  whether  for  the  sake  of  regulating  the 
lumber  supply,  or  for  the  better  control  of  the  sources  and 
flow  of  rivers,  were  wholly  foreign  to  American  ideas.  In 
the  settlement  of  the  East  and  of  the  Ohio  country,  the  clear- 
ing away  of  dense  encumbering  forests  was  the  chief  burden 
and  expense  that  the  pioneer  farmer  had  to  undergo. 

The  rapid  settlement  of  the  prairie  states  was  made  pos- 
sible by  the  existence  of  immense  tracts  of  white  pine  tim- 
ber in  Michigan,  Wisconsin,  and  Minnesota.  One  of  the 
chief  purposes  served  by  the  earlier  railroad  systems  of  the 
Northwest  and  the  masses  of  Eastern  capital  sent  for  West- 
ern development  was  to  be  found  in  the  transformation  of 
those  pine  forests  into  a  million  houses  in  the  prairie  states, 
with  the  farm  appurtenances  of  barns  and  fences.  The 
destruction  of  those  forest  areas  was  at  a  rate  in  exact  pro- 
portion to  the  rapid  upbuilding  of  the  prairie  states.  A 
certain  compensation  —  unconscious,  and  unforeseen  — 


110    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

was  to  be  found  in  the  planting  of  trees  on  prairie  farms. 
In  twenty  or  thirty  years,  trees  attain  a  large  growth  in 
the  rich  prairie  soil,  and  the  landscape  of  states  like  Iowa 
has  been  completely  transformed  by  the  maturing  of  mil- 
lions of  trees. 

While  this  is  commendable,  however,  it  does  not  consti- 
tute afforestation,  or  serve  the  peculiar  purposes  that  ren- 
der forest  tracts  necessary  to  the  well-being  of  the  country. 
If  the  government  had  retained  ownership  of  the  white 
pine  forests  and  had  sold  the  standing  timber  on  a  scientific 
plan,  the  needs  of  prairie  home-makers  would  have  been 
served  just  as  well,  and  the  forests  themselves  would  have 
remained,  yielding  a  perpetual  supply  of  lumber,  and  mean- 
while conserving  and  regulating  the  flow  of  rivers.  The 
American  Forestry  Association  came  into  being  at  a 
fortunate  time  to  give  focus  and  direction  to  a  growing 
intelligence  upon  the  subject  of  the  management  of  the 
remaining  forest  areas  of  America. 

Certain  of  the  states,  notably  New  York,  adopted  a  forest 
policy  based  principally  upon  the  permanent  retention  by 
the  state  of  lands  in  the  Adirondack  forest  which  had  been 
cut  over  by  lumbermen  and  were  forfeited  through  non- 
payment of  taxes.  By  1890  the  New  York  forest  reserve 
had  grown  to  the  dimensions  of  about  a  million  acres.  It 
was  through  such  action,  and  the  gradual  advance  of  public 
opinion,  that  many  renewed  attempts  to  induce  Congress  to 
enter  upon  a  national  forestry  policy  were  at  length  re- 
warded in  1891.  It  is  frequently  the  case  in  public  affairs 
that  after  the  failure  of  careful  and  elaborate  proposals,  a 
policy  of  immense  consequence  is  brought  into  effect  by 
some  incidental  enactment  scarcely  noted  at  the  time. 

In  1873  Congress  had  passed  the  Timber  Culture  Act. 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN    111 

It  allowed  the  homesteader  to  secure  an  additional  one  hun- 
dred and  sixty  acres  on  condition  of  planting  a  part  of  it 
successfully  in  forest  trees.  It  was  conceived  in  total  igno- 
rance of  the  principles  of  forestry,  and  was  a  complete 
failure  except  from  the  standpoint  of  individuals  who 
desired  a  pretext  for  acquiring  valuable  lands  in  their 
neighborhood.  In  1891  this  Timber  Culture  Act  was  very 
properly  repealed.  As  an  amendment  to  the  simple 
measure  of  repeal,  it  was  proposed:  "That  the  President 
of  the  United  States  may,  from  time  to  time,  set  apart  and 
reserve,  in  any  state  or  territory  having  public  lands  bear- 
ing forests,  any  part  of  the  public  lands  wholly  or  in  part 
covered  with  timber  or  undergrowth,  whether  of  commercial 
value  or  not,  as  public  reservation,  and  the  President  shall, 
by  public  proclamation,  declare  the  establishment  of  such 
reservations  and  the  limits  thereof." 

Under  this  provision,  the  movement  went  steadily  for- 
ward until  within  a  period  of  fifteen  years,  up  to  the  end  of 
the  fiscal  year  1906,  forest  reserves  had  been  set  apart  to 
the  number  of  one  hundred  and  six  separate  tracts,  embrac- 
ing one  hundred  and  seven  million  acres.  The  extent  of 
these  reserves  was  thus  greater  than  the  whole  of  New 
England,  New  York,  Pennsylvania,  New  Jersey,  Delaware, 
and  Virginia.  The  policy  was  endangered  in  its  earlier 
years  through  Western  opposition  due  in  part  to  a  mis- 
understanding of  its  nature  and  in  part  to  the  pressure  of 
private  interests,  and  conflicts  arising  from  imperfect  ad- 
ministration. But  successive  Presidents  showed  enlightened 
views  and  followed  scientific  counsels.  Proper  legislation 
was  adopted  for  the  administration  of  the  forest  reserves, 
and  the  policy  became  established  beyond  danger  of  serious 
reversal,  although  Presidential  power  was  lessened  in  1907. 


112    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

These  great  areas  and  their  lumber  resources  are  small  as 
compared  with  the  vast  tracts  of  American  forest  that  are 
privately  held  and  that  are  under  profitable  exploitation 
by  the  so-called  "  lumber  kings,"  who  were,  in  1906,  charged 
with  having  formed  a  trust  and  established  monopoly 
prices.  Such  conditions  merely  gave  further  impetus  to 
the  movement  for  the  reservation  of  government  areas  of 
timbered  land,  which  —  by  virtue  of  additional  proclama- 
tions by  President  Roosevelt  —  embraced  127,000,000  acres, 
or  200,000  square  miles,  at  the  beginning  of  1907.  This 
is  just  equal  to  the  area  of  the  whole  of  France.  It  is 
almost  twice  the  area  of  the  kingdom  of  Italy. 

The  government  is  developing  an  administrative  service 
that  will  be  competent  to  administer  its  immense  forest 
domain  for  various  objects  of  common  welfare.  The  main- 
tenance of  the  forests  is  vital  to  the  advantageous  use  of 
the  people  who  occupy  the  lands  of  the  lower  regions  which 
derive  their  water  from  the  wooded  uplands.  Although 
the  subject  is  a  tempting  one,  it  is  not  my  purpose  to  fore- 
cast the  elaborate  economic  development  that  must  result 
from  the  present  and  prospective  forest  policy  of  the 
government. 

Experience  acquired  in  the  management  of  the  resources 
of  large  Indian  reservations  has  forced  the  government  to 
study  and  administer  methods  of  leasing  grazing  lands,  of 
selling  standing  timber  to  lumber  companies,  and  of  grant- 
ing mining  privileges  to  coal  companies  and  other  corpora- 
tions. Gradually  these  experiences  have  prepared  the  way 
for  a  great  and  permanent  national  policy  under  which 
many  hundreds  of  millions  of  acres  of  the  public  domain 
will  be  permanently  retained  and  administered,  our  govern- 
ment thus  becoming  a  landlord  upon  a  scale  of  magnitude 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN    113 

that  very  few  practical  men  would  have  deemed  possible 
until  very  recently. 

A  phase  of  this  movement  had  illustration  in  President 
Roosevelt's  order  (1907)  withdrawing  from  further  disposi- 
tion to  private  owners  all  the  public  lands  which  had  been 
indicated  by  the  Geological  Survey  as  containing  deposits 
of  coal.  The  area  of  such  lands  was  estimated  at  about 
fifty  million  acres.  This  temporary  order  of  the  President 
was  followed  by  a  carefully  prepared  bill,  providing 
for  the  permanent  reservation  of  lands  estimated  at  one 
hundred  million  acres  in  extent,  on  account  of  their  rich- 
ness in  petroleum,  coal,  and  various  minerals.  Senator 
Nelson's  bill,  which  represented  the  views  of  the  President 
and  of  the  experts  of  several  administrative  departments, 
provided  methods  for  leasing  these  lands,  and  at  the  same 
time  attempted  to  guard  against  monopoly,  or  combination, 
or  unreasonable  prices  in  the  sale  by  the  lessee  of  the  oil, 
coal,  ores,  or  other  products  of  the  public  land  thus  reserved. 

Here  then  is  another  area  of  extent  greater  than  a  Euro- 
pean kingdom,  to  be  held  by  the  government  in  order  that 
its  resources  of  mineral  wealth  may  be  developed  for  the 
general  good.  It  is  easy  now  to  see  that  if  the  value 
of  such  a  policy  had  been  appreciated  in  an  earlier  period, 
particularly  as  respects  coal  lands,  great  public  benefit 
would  have  resulted.  It  is  not  long  since  the  iron  ore  lands 
of  Minnesota  and  the  Lake  Superior  region  were  a  part  of 
the  public  domain.  They  passed  to  private  ownership 
through  a  misapplied  use  of  the  existing  land  laws,  with 
no  compensation  to  the  government  or  the  public.  Yet 
with  scarcely  any  lapse  of  time,  those  iron  ore  lands  are 
valued  at  sums  which  in  the  aggregate  would  probably 
reach  a  thousand  million  dollars.  Colossal  private  fortunes 


114    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

have  already  resulted  from  their  exploitation,  and  they 
have  come  under  a  monopoly  control  which  levies  a  per- 
manent tax  upon  the  entire  country  in  the  cost  of  iron  and 
steel  products. 

It  is  obvious  that  the  government  should  have  retained 
those  mineral  lands,  just  as  it  should  have  retained  its  coal 
lands,  selling  the  ore  to  those  who  needed  it,  upon  a 
simple  system  of  leasing  and  royalties.  The  government 
will  henceforth  be  selling  standing  timber  to  lumbermen, 
water  power  for  electrical  transmission,  water  for  irrigation 
rights,  and  oil,  coal,  and  mineral  privileges,  on  an  ever 
increasing  scale  of  magnitude,  while  it  will  rent  grazing 
lands  equal  in  extent  to  the  greater  part  of  the  country 
east  of  the  Mississippi  River. 

All  this  change  from  the  policy  of  private  ownership  to 
the  policy  of  landlordism  and  collectivism  on  a  great  scale, 
in  the  management  of  the  public  domain,  signifies  no  change 
whatever  in  the  spirit  or  purpose  of  our  American  democ- 
racy. Our  principle  from  the  beginning  has  been  a  construc- 
tive one.  Our  government  has  always  definitely  occupied 
itself  with  the  task  of  creating  a  great  nationality.  In  the 
diversity  of  physical  and  climatic  conditions,  we  have  had 
to  change  our  laws  and  administrative  methods  in  order  to 
achieve  the  building  up  of  true  American  communities  in 
the  vast  regions  of  mountain  and  plain  and  unequal  rain- 
fall, extending  from  Western  Nebraska  to  the  Sierras. 
The  principles  of  democratic  equality  and  personal  initia- 
tive will  not  be  destroyed  by  this  new  policy,  but,  on  the 
contrary,  will  be  promoted  and  kept  alive. 

The  new  policy  has  had  to  await  the  advance  of  scientific 
knowledge,  the  development  of  administrative  efficiency 
and  skill,  the  growth  of  capital  for  the  conduct  of  large 


SETTLEMENT  AND  USE  OF  THE  NATIONAL  DOMAIN    115 

enterprises,  and  a  general  maturing  of  the  country.  Associ- 
ated with  this  rapidly  developing  new  policy  in  the  admin- 
istration of  the  public  domain  will  be  found  the  political 
discussion  and  treatment  of  various  economic  problems, 
such  as  the  regulation  of  railroads  and  interstate  com- 
merce, the  extension  of  government  ownership  and  opera- 
tion to  certain  services  in  which  the  public  has  a  large 
interest,  and  the  perfection  of  various  parts  of  our  political 
and  governmental  machinery. 


PROBLEMS   OF    THE   FRANCHISE,    PRACTICAL    PARTICIPATION 
IN   POLITICS,    AND   THE   WORKING    OF   PARTIES 

THE  fundamental  object  of  the  political  life  of  a  people 
is  to  secure  general  harmony  and  well-being  in  human 
relationships.  The  contentions  of  politics  may  seem  in- 
tense and  even  bitter  at  times,  yet  in  a  country  whose 
development  has  been  favorable  and  fortunate,  the  matters 
of  agreement  and  accord  should  be  so  great  and  substantial, 
when  compared  with  the  matters  of  difference  and  of  clash, 
that  the  play  of  controversy  can  be  kept  within  safe 
limits. 

As  I  have  endeavored  to  make  emphatic  in  the  preceding 
pages,  the  controlling  purpose  of  our  development  through 
more  than  a  hundred  years  has  been  to  create  a  series  of 
conditions  of  population,  of  citizenship,  and  of  opportunity 
with  respect  to  the  land  and  natural  resources  of  a  new 
country,  that  would  make  for  unity  and  harmony.  The  im- 
migration problem  in  its  present  and  future  aspects  must 
be  dealt  with  from  this  standpoint.  For  so  long  a  time  as 
experience  may  show  that  fresh  relays  of  immigrants  can 
be  admitted  without  disturbing  in  any  serious  manner  the 
blending  and  unifying  process  which  tends  to  make  the 
American  population  homogeneous,  the  doors  will  remain 
open.  That  is  to  say,  a  population  using  the  same  lan- 
guage, having  the  same  average  degree  and  kind  of  educa- 

116 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS  117 

tion,  mingling  freely  in  all  pursuits  and  callings,  and  showing 
no  marked  tendency  to  crystallize  into  classes  or  to  become 
segregated  in  localities,  will  require  no  checks  upon  immi- 
gration except  such  as  are  in  the  nature  of  orderly  and 
wholesome  regulation. 

I  have  drawn  upon  our  experience  with  the  race  question 
in  the  South  in  order  to  show  how  two  kinds  of  political 
problems  of  the  extreme  and  dangerous  sort  may  be  brought 
into  the  life  of  a  nation,  — the  one  economic,  the  other 
racial.    The  toleration  of  slavery  created  rival  economic 
systems  that  interfered  with  the  normal  play  of  political 
forces.     Under   such   conditions   there  was   lacking   thatX 
stable  equilibrium,  due  to  a  general  agreement  about  fun-/ 
damental  things,  which  makes  ordinary  political  contro-\ 
versy  a  harmless  outlet  for  energy,  and  even  a  useful  instru-^ 
ment   of  progress. 

The  abolition  of  slavery  ended  the  radical,  underlying 
antagonism  of  economic  systems,  that  had  intensified 
political  differences  touching  concrete  questions,  such  as 
nullification  of  federal  laws  by  states,  the  return  of  fugitive 
slaves,  the  settlement  and  government  of  the  Western  lands, 
the  tariff,  and  so  on.  Even  after  the  slavery  system  was 
ended,  there  remained  a  series  of  transitional  economic 
problems,  abnormal  in  their  sectional  aspects,  due  to  the 
labor  conditions  following  emancipation. 

Far  more  serious,  however,  as  I  have  previously  shown, 
than  the  economic  controversies  in  our  political  life  due 
to  the  development  of  the  Southern  slavery  and  plantation 
system,  has  been  the  discord  arising  from  the  extreme 
divergence  of  racial  type  and  social  condition  between 
the  white  and  negro  populations  of  the  Southern  states. 
Where  such  differences  exist,  political  life  works  under 


118    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

conditions  of  dangerous  tension,  as  through  the  Reconstruc- 
tion period  following  the  war,  and  in  more  recent  mani- 
festations of  the  race  problem. 

Thus  we  have  learned  by  experience  that  in  the  process 
of  nation-building  we  must,  in  so  far  as  possible,  guard 
against  the  creation  of  permanently  discordant  conditions, 
whether  racial  or  economic,  on  a  scale  great  enough  to  en- 
danger the  general  harmony  of  our  future  political  life. 
It  is  upon  considerations  of  this  kind  that  the  philosophical 
statesman  must  justify  measures  to  prevent  the  migration 
of  large  bodies  of  Asiatic  workmen  to  our  Western  states. 
Their  presence  must  mean  both  economic  and  racial 
antagonisms  that  would  cause  the  political  pendulum  to 
oscillate  too  violently. 

I  have  endeavored,  furthermore,  to  show  that  recent 
policies  looking  to  the  permanent  retention  in  government 
hands  of  immense  areas  of  forest  land,  mineral  land, 
and  grazing  land,  have  had  as  their  object  the  far-reaching 
purpose  of  building  up  stable,  democratic  communities, 
preventing  extreme  inequalities  of  social  and  economic 
status,  and  avoiding  the  further  development  of  undesir- 
able conditions  that  would  in  time  have  created  permanent 
sectional  differences  and  given  a  dangerous  intensity  to  cer- 
tain political  problems. 

We  have  perceived  that  whereas  party  and  political 
differences  in  Europe  have  been  due  in  great  part  to  the 
struggle  of  the  masses  against  the  classes,  we  have  been 
steadily  striving  in  this  country  to  prevent  conditions  that 
might  lead  to  the  formation  of  classes.  At  the  same  time 
we  have  been  trying  to  harmonize  differences  arising  in  the 
process  of  the  westward  movement  and  the  development 
of  new  areas.  Differences  between  the  East  and  the 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS          119 

middle  West  disappeared  with,  the  maturing  of  the  Mis- 
sissippi Valley.     No  trace  of  sectional  character  remained 
—  as  between  Massachusetts  and  Illinois,  for  example  - 
in  the  alignment  of  parties  or   the   practical   issues   of 
politics. 

In  short,  it  is  the  business  of  statesmanship  in  a  develop- 
ing country  so  to  control  the  factors  of  nation-building  as 
to  secure  a  constantly  diminishing  field  for  the  play  of  po- 
litical controversy.  It  has  not  been  many  years  since  the 
chosen  leader  of  a  great  national  party,  at  the  height  of  a 
Presidential  campaign,  declared  that  he  had  come  into  "  the 
enemy's  country"  when  he  took  the  platform  in  the  state 
of  New  York.  A  single  decade  has  brought  about  a  vast 
change  in  the  sectional  feeling  that  then  prevailed.  The 
natural  course  of  business  development,  together  with  the 
fortunate  operation  of  public  policies,  has  removed  one 
subject  after  another  from  the  field  of  sharp  and  extreme 
political  controversy.  Thus  great  strength  has  been  added 
to  that  general  foundation  of  harmony  and  social  content, 
to  establish  which  is  so  prime  an  object  in  the  political 
life  of  a  nation. 

As  I  have  endeavored  to  show,  the  elements  of  prog- 
ress now  at  work  will  from  this  time  forth  bring  Southern 
political  life  into  a  more  normal  condition.  By  degrees 
those  more  dangerous  phases  of  the  race  problem  that  have 
not  merely  dominated  the  political  life  of  the  Southern 
states  themselves,  but  have  affected  indirectly  the  higher 
politics  of  the  nation,  will  be  outgrown  and  will  disappear. 

Thus  we  have  been  building  our  Ship  of  State  for  per- 
manence, for  safety,  and  for  steadiness  of  average  move- 
ment. The  elements  of  human  nature  cannot  be  greatly 
changed.  The  winds  will  blow  from  prevailing  quarters, 


120    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

and  the  storms  will  rage  in  their  seasons.  But  if  the  build- 
ers well  understand  what  conditions  the  ship  must  meet, 
they  may  minimize  the  risks.  We  shall  never  have  a 
perfect  ship  of  state,  nor  can  we  expect  long  periods  of 
ideal  weather  in  our  political  life.  But  we  can  be  con- 
stantly improving  the  ship,  and  minimizing  the  disadvan- 
tages and  dangers  due  to  variations  of  wind,  weather,  and 
tide. 

I  cannot  dwell  too  strongly  upon  this  consideration  as 
one  that  should  be  kept  clearly  in  mind  both  by  students 
of  our  political  history  and  also  by  those  who  participate 
in  our  political  life  from  public-spirited  motives.  For  it  is 
consoling  to  believe  that  every  time  an  impending  evil  is 
averted  by  preventive  statesmanship,  or  an  existing  evil 
is  cured  or  arrested  in  its  progress  by  some  timely  applica- 
tion of  remedies,  there  is  solid  ground  gained  and  perma- 
nent improvement  made,  with  a  resultant  shrinkage  of 
the  bounds  of  controversy. 

So  long  as  there  is  a1  pervading  intelligence  in  the  body 
of  citizenship,  there  can  be  no  danger  of  the  kind  of  har- 
mony that  would  suggest  stagnation  or  decay.  It  is  not 
harmful  to  arrive,  now  and  then,  in  the  progress  of  a 
nation,  at  periods  termed  in  American  political  parlance 
"eras  of  good  feeling,"  when,  along  with  a  high  degree  of 
confidence  in  the  ability,  effectiveness,  and  good  faith  of 
those  charged  with  official  duties,  is  to  be  found  a  disposi- 
tion to  lay  aside  political  controversy  and  dwell  upon  points 
of  agreement  rather  than  upon  points  of  difference.  In  the 
nature  of  things,  such  periods  cannot  last  very  long,  but 
they  serve  some  useful  purposes. 

There  is  a  wide  range  of  political  and  governmental  work 
to  be  done  that  requires  diligence  and  skill  and  disinterested 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS          121 

public  spirit.  And  in  periods  when  the  flame  of  contro- 
versy burns  low,  it  often  happens  that  excellent  political 
progress  is  made  in  a  spirit  of  candor  and  cooperation, 
through  the  united  efforts  of  men  who  have  more  usually 
spent  their  energies  in  the  strife  of  parties.  I  am  firmly 
of  the  opinion  that  these  periods  of  comparatively  smooth 
seas  and  bright  skies  can  be  rendered  more  frequent  in 
their  recurrence  and  longer  in  their  duration. 

But  to  that  end  we  must  continue  to  follow  two 
main  lines  of  constructive  policy  in  our  further  work  as  a 
nation.  One  of  these  lines  I  have  sufficiently  indicated  in 
my  illustrations  of  the  means  we  have  taken  thus  far  to 
create  unity  in  our  citizenship,  through  the  building  up  of 
a  blended  and  homogeneous  American  type,  with  absolute 
faith  in  democracy,  and  with  unlimited  stress  upon  the 
education  and  training  of  the  children  as  factors  in  political 
and  social  life.  The  other  line  of  policy  is  of  the  subjective 
rather  than  the  objective  kind  and  has  to  do  less  with 
laws  and  with  measures  employed  by  the  government  in 
the  shaping  of  its  citizenship  than  with  the  democracy 
itself  in  its  attempts  to  maintain  its  own  efficiency  and  to 
make  its  organs  of  government  responsive  to  its  will. 

For,  as  I  have  said  repeatedly,  it  is  the  great  business 
and  concern  of  government  to  look  ahead  and  shape  its 
citizenship  aright;  while  it  is  the  business  of  the  citizens 
constantly  to  perfect  and  improve  the  government  either 
in  the  details  of  its  structure  or  in  the  quality  and  efficiency 
of  its  law-making  and  its  administrative  work.  I  wish 
at  this  point  to  dwell  upon  this  relation  between  the 
people  and  the  government  as  of  itself  in  this  country  con- 
stituting, when  viewed  in  its  entirety,  one  of  the  greatest, 
if  not  the  very  chief,  of  our  political  problems. 


122    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Consider  what  the  government  does  to  create  the 
citizen  body.  It  has  provided  the  landed  domain  and  the 
various  means  of  a  constitutional  and  legal  sort  for  main- 
taining equality  of  economic,  social,  and  political  oppor- 
tunity. It  has  controlled  the  conditions  of  migration  with 
a  view  to  the  essential  solidarity  of  the  people  who  owe  it 
their  allegiance.  It  has  set  up  a  standard  of  national, 
universal  suffrage,  the  state  governments  being  allowed  to 
modify  the  standard  within  reasonable  limits.  It  has 
allowed  the  foreigner  to  become  naturalized  upon  easy  con- 
ditions, and  it  has  given  the  states  a  wide  range  of  liberty 
in  their  efforts  to  create  conditions  favorable  to  the  growth 
of  communities  capable  of  wise  self-direction. 

The  government  has  attached  so  much  importance  to  the 
status  of  citizenship,  that  it  has  tried  to  safeguard  the 
humblest  laborer,  in  order  to  improve  his  standard  of  liv- 
ing, and  to  save  his  dignity  as  an  equal  member  of  the 
great  body  of  freemen.  Government  mediates  between 
capital  and  labor  to  an  ever  increasing  extent,  not  merely 
to  protect  the  larger  public  from  the  inconvenience  of 
strikes  and  labor  disputes,  but  to  aid  constantly  in  the 
process  of  improving  the  conditions  of  labor,  in  order  to 
sustain  the  standards  of  American  citizenship. 

Through  a  long  series  of  progressive  steps,  government 
has  improved  the  social,  economic,  and  political  status  of 
women.  As  teachers  in  the  schools,  they  now  constitute 
the  most  important  body  of  public  servants  in  the  employ- 
ment of  the  state.  In  many  of  the  states  they  are  en- 
titled to  vote  in  school  elections,  in  other  states  in  municipal 
elections,  and  in  a  few  states  they  have  obtained  the  full 
political  franchise. 

The  underlying  object  has  been  to  secure  a  high  condi- 


" 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS         123 

tion  of  democratic  society.  Women,  as  well  as  men,  must 
be  enlightened  and  capable  of  a  part  in  organized  social 
life.  Government  expects  them,  in  the  home  and  in 
the  school,  to  supply  the  most  important  part  of  the 
training  of  its  future  citizens.  And  as  I  have  said  again 
and  again,  the  chief  business  of  constructive  politics 
is  to  make  sure  of  the  future  through  the  training  of  the 
young  and  the  transmission  of  ideals.  The  enlightened 
modern  government,  therefore,  spares  no  effort  to  fit  its 
women  for  their  paramount  duty  in  this  regard. 

It  becomes  a  question  of  experimental  detail,  whether 
women  assist  in  the  carrying  on  of  the  mechanical  tasks  of 
government,  or  whether  they  leave  the  business  of  voting 
and  office-holding  to  men.  Social  organization  becomes 
ever  more  intricate  as  civilization  advances.  There  are 
many  forms  of  activity,  some  of  them  comparatively  new, 
in  which  women  can  advantageously  occupy  their  increas- 
ing margin  of  leisure  and  freedom.  Thus  far,  it  seems  to 
be  the  prevailing  view  that  there  is  social  and  political  ad- 
vantage in  leaving  to  men  the  more  formal  errands  and 
functions  of  politics,  in  order  to  avoid  duplication  of  effort 
and  to  reserve  to  women  a  greater  freedom  for  those  even 
more  important  domestic  and  social  activities  that  are  at 
present  regarded  as  their  necessary  sphere. 

In  a  community  where  the  forces  of  public  opinion  are 
working  in  a  somewhat  ideal  way,  the  voters  on  election 
day  can  — in  the  nature  of  the  case,  speaking  in  average 
terms  — merely  register  the  social  will.  Going  to  the  polls 
under  such  circumstances  constitutes  a  family  errand.  In  a 
normal  society  based  upon  freedom  and  intelligence,  the 
most  convenient  and  effective  machinery  of  government 
becomes  simply  a  matter  of  experiment.  Unquestionably, 


124    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

it  is  the  object  of  government  to  develop  the  social  and 
public  capacity  of  women  as  well  as  of  men,  and  when  all 
adults  are  so  trained  as  to  be  fit  for  the  suffrage  and  for 
eligibility  to  office,  it  will  come  to  be  a  less  rather  than  a 
more  important  question,  precisely  how  the  electorate  is 
made  up. 

It  is  necessary  in  our  democratic  state  so  to  adjust  con- 
ditions and  to  provide  opportunities  as  to  enable  every 
individual  to  exercise  all  the  social  and  political  influence 
of  which  he  or  she  may  be  capable.  In  this  way,  public 
opinion  is  built  up;  and  such  public  opinion,  based  upon 
intelligence  and  character,  will  find  a  way  to  put  its  deter- 
minations into  effect. 

There  is  nothing  absolute  or  final,  therefore,  in  the  pre- 
vailing rule  which  gives  the  political  franchise  to  male 
voters  above  the  age  of  twenty-one,  merely  excluding  crimi- 
nals and  vagrants.  In  the  earlier  days  of  the  Republic, 
the  more  conservative  people  were  afraid  of  unrestricted 
suffrage,  and  desired  to  confine  political  enfranchisement 
to  those  who  were  manifestly  respectable  and  competent, 
—the  possessors  of  property,  the  heads  of  families,  the 
members  of  churches,  and  so  on. 

But  with  the  nationalizing  of  the  American  type  in  the 
westward  sweep  of  pioneering  progress,  came  the  spirit  of 
confidence  in  the  people,  and — what  was  a  wholly  new 
thing  in  the  world  —  the  belief  in  something  like  univer- 
sality of  intelligence  and  character,  and  in  equality  upon 
a  high  level.  Thus,  unrestricted  male  suffrage  prevails 
throughout  the  country  with  exceptions  notable  only  in 
the  addition  of  woman  suffrage  in  Colorado  and  other 
Western  states,  and  the  exclusion  of  negro  illiterates  in 
the  South. 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS        125 

The  exclusion  of  illiterates  in  Massachusetts  represents 
fastidiousness  rather  than  important  statesmanship.  The 
essential  thing  in  Massachusetts  is  the  true  statesman- 
ship of  its  advanced  educational  system,  its  laws  ex- 
cluding children  from  factories,  and  its  attempts  to  throw 
safeguards  around  the  employment  of  women. 

As  for  the  exclusion  of  negro  illiterates  in  the  South,  it  is 
to  be  treated  as  a  policy  looking  in  the  end  toward  a  real 
enfranchisement.  A  dominant  and  resistless  determination 
on  the  part  of  the  white  population  of  the  South  had  ex- 
cluded the  negroes  altogether  from  participation  in  poli- 
tics, except  in  a  few  localities,  and  the  negroes  had  in  prac- 
tice accepted  the  situation.  But  the  negro  still  possessed 
the  theoretical  right  to  vote,  and  there  was  instability  and 
constant  danger  in  a  situation  brought  about  and  sus- 
tained illegally,  that  offered  peculiar  temptation  to  dema- 
gogues in  times  of  factional  controversy  between  elements 
of  the  white  population. 

Thus,  the  legal  disfranchisement  of  negro  illiterates 
paved  the  way  for  a  more  stable  political  condition  in 
the  South,  and  gave  opportunity  for  the  gradual  building 
up  of  a  normal  public  opinion  and  a  proper  play  of  politi- 
cal life  among  the  citizens  of  the  dominant  race.  When, 
after  another  decade  or  two,  the  political  life  of  the  white 
voters  of  the  South  has  reasserted  itself  in  a  wholesome 
way,  the  negroes  who  possess  fitness  will  undoubtedly 
be  admitted  to  the  exercise  of  their  legal  political  rights 
by  the  voluntary  action  of  their  white  neighbors. 

The  acquisition  of  the  franchise  by  the  emancipated 
slaves  of  the  South  was  abnormal,  and  it  came  about 
through  the  exercise  of  a  power  that  was  extraneous 
and  arbitrary.  To  be  useful  or  permanent,  the  exercise  of 


126    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

political  privilege  must  find  its  local  and  inherent  reasons. 
The  negroes  of  the  South  will  never  arrive  at  a  valuable 
exercise  of  the  franchise  until  they  come  into  it  upon  their 
recognized  merits  as  useful  members  of  their  local  com- 
munities, and  are  invited  into  it  by  their  white  neighbors. 

So  much  for  the  conditions  of  citizenship  as  the  state 
ordains  and  provides.  But,  even  as  the  state  makes  the 
citizens,  so  the  citizens  in  turn  must  make  the  state;  that 
is  to  say,  they  must  keep  the  government  effective,  and 
responsive  to  their  real  purposes  and  wishes.  And  to 
understand  how  this  is  done  in  practice,  we  must  consider 
two  elaborate  sets  of  machinery,  the  one  set  official  and 
the  other  voluntary. 

The  voluntary  machinery  consists  of  the  more  permanent 
organization  of  political  parties,  and  the  more  temporary  or 
special  groupings  and  associations  of  citizens  for  particular 
or  local  political  purposes.  The  official  machinery  consists 
first,  of  the  government  of  the  United  States,  regarded  as  a 
" going  concern";  that  is  to  say,  of  its  legal  structure  and 
its  personnel  of  several  hundred  thousand  officials,  from  the 
President  in  the  White  House  to  the  letter-carrier  or  the 
apprentice-boy  on  a  warship.  Then  comes  the  machinery 
for  the  government  of  the  states,  the  government  of  the 
counties,  that  of  incorporated  cities,  towns,  and  villages, 
and  that  of  country  townships  and  of  road  and  school 
districts. 

When  we  look  at  politics  from  the  voluntary  side,  it  is 
best  perhaps  to  begin  with  the  presidential  campaign  as  the 
culminating  point  in  what  an  able  student  of  our  system 
describes  as  our  "quadrennial  political  cycle."  When,  on 
the  other  hand,  we  study  political  mechanism  on  the  official 
side,  there  are  some  advantages  in  beginning  with  the 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS        127 

smaller  units  of  self-government  and  administration.  It  is 
obvious  that  the  voluntary  political  structure  cannot  be 
understood  at  all  unless  one  has  somewhat  clearly  in  mind 
the  characteristics  of  the  official  mechanism. 

As  I  have  already  stated,  it  is  no  part  of  my  plan  to 
dwell  upon  the  formal  structure  or  operation  of  our  gov- 
ernment. But  there  are  some  characteristics  of  it  that  we 
must  keep  in  mind  in  order  to  appreciate  the  nature  of 
certain  problems  with  which  the  political  life  concerns  itself. 

We  have  always  been  a  very  busy  nation,  and,  upon 
the  whole,  a  sober-minded  one.  But  our  people  have  been 
buoyant,  hopeful,  and  of  resilient  spirit,  and  they  have 
found  in  politics  many  of  the  features  of  a  great  national 
game,  besides  finding  opportunity  for  the  play  of  ambition 
and  for  the  achievement  of  distinction.  In  countries  where 
the  primary  objects  of  modern  political  life  are  not  fully 
achieved,  —  that  is  to  say,  where  democracy  is  still  fight- 
ing its  battle  against  aristocracy  and  intrenched  privi- 
lege, —  it  is  impossible  in  the  nature  of  the  case  for  political 
life  to  assume  as  it  does  in  the  United  States  the  stimulat- 
ing and  exciting  qualities  of  a  public  diversion,  into  which 
men  may  enter  in  a  spirit  of  competition  that  is  in  its  main 
aspects  neither  dangerous  nor  unwholesome. 

But  a  more  important  explanation  of  many  of  the  phe- 
nomena of  our  political  life  is  to  be  found  in  the  training  and 
opportunity  given  by  the  government  of  our  smaller  political 
units.  We  have  several  thousand  counties  in  the  United 
States,  each  with  its  governing  board  of  supervisors,  its 
sheriff,  its  treasurer,  its  auditor,  its  superintendent  of 
schools,  and  its  other  officers.  If  we  have,  say,  4000  coun- 
ties, we  have  perhaps  50,000  or  60,000  townships,  each  with 
its  elective  board  or  group  of  officials ;  and  we  have  a  far 


128    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

greater  number  of  school  districts  and  road  districts  which 
in  most  parts  of  the  country  elect  their  public  servants 
by  popular  vote.  When  one  makes  reckoning  of  the  villages 
and  the  larger  municipal  corporations,  and  attempts  to  find 
out  how  many  people  are  officially  serving  their  fellow- 
citizens  in  elective  offices  under  our  political  system,  it 
would  be  conservative  to  estimate  that  there  must  be 
considerably  more  than  a  million. 

For  every  fifteen  or  twenty  voters,  there  must  be  upon 
the  average  at  least  one  man  who  holds  a  position  to  which 
he  has  been  chosen  by  the  votes  of  his  fellow-citizens,  and 
who  may  rightly  feel  that  he  is  in  a  place  of  public  trust 
and  has  achieved  some  local  distinction.  What  all  this 
means  in  our  political  life  is  better  understood  when  one 
brings  it  into  comparison  with  conditions  as  they  have 
hitherto  existed  in  England,  for  example. 

Until  very  recently  the  opportunity  for  the  ordinary  citi- 
zen in  England  to  serve  his  fellow-men  by  holding  public 
office,  or  to  gratify  his  ambition  by  entering  political  life, 
was  extremely  limited.  A  few  men,  very  favorably  placed, 
might  hope  to  enter  the  House  of  Commons.  In  the  larger 
towns  and  cities,  a  few  might  be  elected  to  membership  in 
municipal  councils.  There  was  practically  nothing  else. 

Under  recent  legislation  there  are  elective  county  coun- 
cils in  England  and  elective  parish  councils  correspond- 
ing somewhat  to  our  township  boards.  In  the  course  of 
another  generation,  the  opportunity  to  serve  upon  these 
local  boards  will  have  marked  effect  upon  the  political  life 
of  England.  But  hitherto  the  whole  spirit  of  English 
political  life  has  been  aristocratic.  There  has  been  no  such 
thing  as  the  regular  holding  of  elections,  except  for  members 
of  municipal  councils.  And  the  great  complicated  structure 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS        129 

of  popularly  worked  political  machinery  has  been  prac- 
tically unknown. 

It  would  be  impossible  to  overestimate  the  influence 
upon  our  actual  political  life  of  the  opportunities  afforded 
by  the  existence,  for  example,  of  fifty  governorships  of 
American  commonwealths,  along  with  the  other  elective 
state  offices  of  dignity  and  influence,  and  the  numerous 
judiciary  positions,  elective  in  most  of  the  states  and  carry- 
ing with  them  great  consideration.  In  its  practical  work- 
ing, the  system  has  had  a  marvelous  effect  in  stimulating 
effort  and  developing  capacity  in  the  ordinary  citizen. 

In  European  public  life  the  opportunities  are  too  few 
and  the  gradations  too  severe  for  the  ordinary  citizen, 
who,  in  consequence,  can  seldom  hope  to  leap  across  the 
broad  gulf  that  separates  private  from  public  life.  But 
with  us  it  is  wholly  different.  With  a  million  or  more  of 
elective  offices,  and  the  tradition  of  rotation  in  such  places, 
every  ambitious  boy  may  be  able  to  secure  a  fair  test  of  his 
political  aptitudes.  He  may  not  merely  join  the  torch- 
light processions,  attend  the  barbecues,  applaud  the  ora- 
tors, and  come  under  the  spell  of  party  rivalry  in  heated 
national  campaigns,  but  he  may  find  himself  useful  and 
in  due  time  important  in  that  local  fraction  of  the  party 
that  is  representative  of  voluntary  political  life  for  his 
township,  or  village,  or  city  ward,  or  voting  precinct,  while 
he  may  also  make  his  way  into  official  place  and  rank 
through  the  opportunities  afforded  by  the  political  structure 
of  the  smaller  governing  units. 

In  his  political  life,  both  on  the  voluntary  side  and  on 
the  local  official  side,  he  becomes  acquainted  with  the  par- 
liamentary forms  under  which  political  meetings  are  con- 
ducted, and  he  acquires  the  ability  to  stand  upon  his  feet 


130    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

and  argue  for  his  public  views,  whether  upon  the  manage- 
ment of  local  roads  and  schools,  or  upon  the  national  tariff, 
the  control  of  railroads,  or  the  relation  of  the  Monroe  Doc- 
trine to  the  acquisition  of  the  Philippines. 

In  performing  the  simple  functions  of  a  township 
treasurer  or  of  an  elected  assessor  of  property  for  pur- 
poses of  taxation,  he  acquires  a  certain  training  and 
capacity  as  respects  the  problems  of  public  finance  that 
in  thousands  of  instances  have  a  remarkable  educational 
effect,  when  taken  in  conjunction  with  the  habit  of  carrying 
our  national  problems  of  taxation,  finance,  money,  and 
banking,  into  popular  discussion.  The  practice  of  financial 
administration  in  townships,  municipalities,  and  counties 
—  aided  by  the  habitual  discussion  of  larger  financial 
problems,  either  as  party  questions  or  as  a  matter  of  intel- 
lectual diversion  — have  given  us  a  set  of  capable  citizens 
in  almost  every  county  and  smaller  community  in  the 
United  States,  who  could  be  translated  into  high  office 
and  positions  of  great  authority,  with  the  reasonable  cer- 
tainty that  they  would  show  fairly  good  judgment,  main- 
tain proper  dignity,  and  quickly  grasp  the  more  technical, 
as  well  as  the  more  general,  duties  of  a  state  treasurership 
or  a  position  in  the  national  government. 

The  young  citizen  showing  aptitude  and  trustworthy 
qualities  in  his  township  or  village  may  become  a  factor 
in  the  government  of  his  county;  then  a  member  of  the 
state  legislature;  and  thus  he  may  go  forward  upon  his 
merits  and  abilities  to  the  higher  places  of  state  and  national 
life.  Along  with  the  opportunities  readily  in  reach  of  hun- 
dreds of  thousands,  even  millions,  of  citizens  afforded  by 
the  multiplication  of  local  elective  and  appointive  offices,  are 
also  to  be  reckoned  the  opportunities  for  influence,  power, 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS        131 

and  diversion  afforded  by  the  non-official  organizations, 
built  up  through  the  voluntary  association  of  citizens  for 
the  choice  of  candidates,  the  formulation  of  policies,  and 
the  effective  control  of  the  official  machinery. 

This  vast  complicated  double  system  of  political  life  makes 
its  strong  appeal  to  almost  every  citizen  of  the  land  from 
one  motive  or  from  another.  Americans  are  preeminently 
political  animals,  with  a  fondness  for  organization;  and  al- 
most every  healthy  citizen  feels  the  attraction  of  politics  as 
a  diversion,  —  a  great  continuing  game,  with  its  national, 
its  state,  and  its  local  phases,  its  great  culminating  periods 
every  four  years,  extending  from  the  national  conventions 
of  June  or  July,  to  the  elections  of  the  following  November, 
— an  exciting  pursuit  that  is  followed  with  less  intensity' 
through  the  succeeding  years,  with  its  state  and  local  objects, 
until  the  quadrennial  cycle  is  completed  and  the  Presiden- 
tial year  again  comes  around. 

To  most  citizens  this  great  game  is  fascinating  if  only  as 
a  form  of  social  diversion,  appealing  to  the  universal  in- 
stinct for  politics.  To  very  many  the  political  life  makes 
appeal  through  the  motive  of  ambition,  success  being  a 
mark  of  personal  distinction.  Other  devotees  it  enlists 
because  of  the  opportunity  it  gives  to  impress  one's  views 
upon  the  community  and  to  perform  actual  public  service. 
And  others  cultivate  it  through  a  sincere  devotion  to  cer- 
tain fixed  trends  of  opinion,  out  of  which  party  spirit  and 
organization  have  been  gradually  evolved. 

Finally,  with  so  many  offices  to  be  filled,  and  so  many 
points  of  contact  between  the  political  and  the  business 
world,  it  is  natural  enough  that  politics  should  have  become 
in  itself  a  form  of  business  activity,  and  that  the  politician 
and  the  office-seeker  should  have  emerged  by  the  hundreds 


132    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

of  thousands  as  a  distinct  type  or  class,  looking  upon  public 
employment  as  a  means  of  livelihood,  and  also  pursuing 
partisan  and  other  non-official  political  activities  from  the 
pecuniary  motive.  The  growth  of  the  party  system  in 
the  United  States  is  to  be  attributed  to  all  these  motives 
and  conditions. 

The  European  observer  is  constantly  trying  to  find  some 
essential  analogy  between  American  parties  and  those  with 
which  he  is  familiar  in  other  countries.  He  pursues  his 
inquiry  with  some  confidence  for  a  little  distance,  and  then 
finds  himself  completely  baffled.  As  a  rule,  he  desires  to 
find  one  great  American  party  radical  in  its  tendencies  and 
the  other  conservative. 

What  he  really  finds  in  existence  are  two  great  perma- 
nent institutions,  constantly  undergoing  modification,  some- 
times violently  affected  by  internal  revolution,  but  somehow 
maintaining  continuity  through  the  decades  and  through  the 
generations.  These  American  parties  are  political  agencies 
or  vehicles.  With  respect  to  a  public  question  that  may 
strongly  affect  public  opinion  at.  a  given  moment,  one  of 
these  great  mechanisms  is  likely  to  be  taken  possession  of 
for  radical  purposes,  while  the  other,  from  force  of  circum- 
stances, will  lend  itself  to  conservative  uses. 

Where  neither  one  of  the  great  traditional  organizations 
has  shown  itself  responsive  enough  to  some  comparatively 
sudden  wave  of  conviction  regarding  a  particular  subject, 
new  organizations  have  been  launched  to  represent  a  point 
of  view  and  to  make  a  propaganda  or  a  crusade  for  a  special 
cause,  unencumbered  by  the  burden  of  general  responsibility 
belonging  to  the  older  political  organizations.  Sometimes 
these  new  movements  have  so  coincided  with  internal  revo- 
lution in  an  older  party  that  they  have  drawn  to  themselves 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS          133 

vitality  enough  for  permanence.  But  in  that  case  they 
have  ceased  to  represent  the  special  cause  which  explained 
their  origin,  and  have  come  to  serve  the  more  general  pur- 
poses of  an  American  institutional  party. 

Thus  the  Federalists  broke  down  and  reappeared  in  the 
later  Whig  organization,  which,  in  turn,  after  some  brief 
special  movements,  like  that  of  the  Free-Soil  party  in  the 
fifties,  found  new  birth  in  the  great  Republican  party,  which 
is  entering  on  the  third  generation  of  its  existence. 

The  great  Democratic  party,  meanwhile,  has  kept  its 
name  and  its  essential  continuity  through  more  than  a 
hundred  years,  with  many  an  internal  struggle  and  con- 
stant modification  through  changes  in  the  drift  of  public 
opinion.  Most  native  Americans  have  found  themselves 
by  birth  or  by  natural  association  affiliated  with  one  or 
the  other  of  these  great  party  systems.  They  have  found 
very  considerable  room  for  play  of  opinion  within  the  struc- 
ture of  the  party. 

Most  naturalized  citizens,  on  the  other  hand,  have  found 
themselves  drawn  into  the  one  organization  or  the  other 
through  accident,  or  instinct,  or  tribal  clannishness.  The 
Democrats  in  New  York,  Baltimore,  and  other  Eastern  cities 
had  perfected  a  form  of  party  organization  which  was  both 
congenial  and  advantageous  to  the  Irish  immigrant.  A 
different  set  of  circumstances  drew  the  German  immigrants 
largely  into  the  Republican  organization.  For  like  reasons, 
the  Scandinavians  of  the  Northwest  became  Republicans 
for  the  most  part. 

In  the  westward  movement,  the  name  Democracy 
had  identified  itself  with  the  ideas  of  personal  and 
local  freedom  and  state  assertion.  The  leaders  of  the 
slave  power  had  by  degrees  and  with  much  political  skill 


134    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

captured  control  of  the  machinery  and  the  higher  councils 
of  the  Democratic  party.  When  Secession  came,  the 
Republican  party  found  itself  identified  with  the  cause  of 
the  Union  and  an  unbroken  nationality.  Naturally,  a 
vast  number  of  so-called  "war  Democrats"  of  the  North, 
either  through  conviction  or  advantage,  passed  by  degrees 
into  the  Republican  ranks. 

The  Republican  leaders  of  the  North  had  enfranchised 
the  slaves,  and  naturally  sought  after  the  war  to  retain  a 
political  domination  through  negro  votes  in  the  Southern 
states.  The  more  determined  and  drastic  their  Southern 
policy,  the  more  certain  was  it  that  two  things  would  hap- 
pen :  first,  a  reaction  in  the  North,  with  a  strong  and  per- 
manent revival  of  the  Northern  Democratic  party;  and, 
second,  a  union  of  Southern  white  men  for  defensive  pur- 
poses under  the  Democratic  banner. 

Thus  there  arose  a  situation  which  had  a  tendency  to 
intensify  party  life  and  organization  and  to  keep  sectional 
and  race  questions  to  the  front  in  such  a  way  as  to  hamper 
the  true  progress  of  the  country.  Republican  leadership 
found  it  expedient  to  play  upon  Northern  prejudice  by 
warnings  that  Democratic  success  would  mean  a  virtual 
reenslavement  of  the  negroes,  and  the  payment  by  the 
nation  of  the  Confederate  war  debt.  And  other  like 
apprehensions  were  aroused. 

The  Democratic  politicians,  on  the  other  hand,  sought  to 
keep  the  South  solid  in  support  of  their  party  through  con- 
stant reminders  of  the  evils  of  the  Reconstruction  period, 
and  assertions  regarding  the  future  purposes  of  the  Repub- 
lican leaders.  Circumstances  had  brought  the  two  great 
parties  to  opposing  attitudes  with  respect  to  the  tariff  ques- 
tion, and  this  question  had  also  assumed  certain  sectional 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS       135 

phases,  so  that  in  campaigns  of  acute  tariff  discussion, 
public  opinion  had  driven  masses  of  voters  from  one  camp 
to  the  other. 

Again,  when  the  great  Prohibition  wave  swept  across  the 
country,  those  old  elements  of  moral  reform  which  had  op- 
posed slavery  and  had,  for  the  most  part,  associated  them- 
selves with  the  Republican  party,  were  strong  enough  in 
many  states  to  bring  the  official  force  of  their  party  into  line 
against  the  liquor  traffic.  This  attitude  drove  scores  of  thou- 
sands of  Germans  and  other  voters  of  foreign  descent  into 
the  Democratic  organization.  Meanwhile,  the  more  intense 
adherents  of  the  Prohibition  cult,  brooking  no  compromise 
or  delay,  and  invoking  the  spirit  and  example  of  the  irrec- 
oncilable Abolitionists  of  an  earlier  day,  formed  themselves 
into  a  third  party,  destined,  of  course,  to  a  gradual  decline 
as  the  question  of  the  moment  lost  its  intensity. 

In  like  fashion,  the  Greenback  movement  had  arisen,  pro- 
testing against  the  payment  of  the  war  debt  in  gold,  and  the 
resumption  of  a  specie  basis.  Then  came  the  Western  Gran- 
ger movement,  based  on  opposition  to  railroad  domination 
and  monopoly  influence.  The  acute  phases  of  these  agita- 
tions expressed  themselves  in  independent  temporary  Third 
Party  movements,  while  the  questions  at  issue  affected 
profoundly  the  character  and  conduct  of  the  older  parties, 
while  also  causing  a  considerable  change  in  their  member- 
ship. The  later  Populistic  movement  had  a  somewhat 
similar  career,  its  chief  historical  results  having  to  do  with 
the  conditions  of  party  in  the  Southern  states. 

When,  in  1896,  the  gold  standard  wing  prevailed  in  the 
Republican  organization,  and  the  free  silver  wing  seized  firm 
control  of  the  Democratic  machinery,  there  was  a  great  drift 
of  Eastern  Democrats  to  the  Republican  camp,  while  the 


136     POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OP  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Republicans  of  the  Far  West  by  the  hundreds  of  thousands 
transferred  their  allegiance  to  the  party  led  by  Mr.  Bryan. 
Meanwhile,  the  increased  production  of  gold  settled  the 
money  question  outside  of  the  political  sphere.  The  con- 
servative wing  of  the  Democracy  nominated  Judge  Parker 
for  the  presidency  in  1904.  The  younger  and  more  vital 
forces  of  the  Republican  party  nominated  Mr.  Roosevelt. 
And  the  Western  Republicans,  who  had  in  previous  cam- 
paigns followed  Mr.  Bryan  as  an  exponent  of  their  financial 
and  economic  views,  returned  with  enthusiasm  to  the 
Republican  fold. 

All  this  I  have  set  forth,  not  by  way  of  a  summary  of 
party  history,  but  rather  for  illustration  of  the  nature  of  the 
two  great  dominating  parties.  They  are  institutional  and 
organic.  At  moments  when  public  opinion  is  greatly  stirred 
by  some  question  of  the  hour,  the  parties  seem  to  exist  for 
the  sake  of  representing  the  opposing  views  and  fighting  the 
resultant  battles.  But,  in  reality,  the  parties  exist  simply 
because  the  great  business  of  politics  in  America  is  so 
extended,  so  complex,  and  so  continuous,  that  it  requires 
permanent  organization. 

It  is  conceivable  that  this  permanent  voluntary  organi- 
zation might  go  forward,  with  a  single  party,  inside  of 
which  different  tendencies  and  views  should  from  time  to 
time  assert  themselves.  This,  indeed,  is  exactly  what  is 
now  going  on  in  a  number  of  the  Southern  states,  where, 
for  all  practical  purposes,  the  Democratic  party  occupies 
the  entire  field,  and  where  the  official  election  merely  rati- 
fies the  decisions  that  have  been  arrived  at  in  previous 
conventions  or  primary  elections  of  this  dominant  party. 

There  have  been  brief  periods  in  the  larger  national  life 
when  a  single  party  was  so  dominant  that  the  preliminary 


THE  CITIZEN    AND   HIS  PART  IN   POLITICS          13? 

struggle  of  opposing  elements  within  the  party  had  more 
significance  than  the  formal  campaign  and  election  which 
expressed  the  relative  strength  of  the  two  party  organiza- 
tions. But,  generally  speaking,  there  have  been  reasons 
growing  out  of  differences  of  public  opinion  on  the  one 
hand,  and  out  of  the  practical  conditions  of  the  business  of 
politics  on  the  other  hand,  to  justify  the  existence  and 
continuity  of  two  great  rival  organizations. 

Their  instinct  has  been  to  align  themselves  with  the  larger 
and  more  permanent  trends  of  cleavage  in  public  opinion. 
They  have  endeavored  to  keep  their  national  character  by 
popularizing  the  controversial  aspects  of  public  questions. 
Their  appeals  from  time  to  time  to  enlightened  public 
opinion,  or  to  wide-spread  prejudice,  have  been  made 
through  the  resolutions,  or  so-called  " platforms"  adopted 
every  four  years  by  the  great  party  convention  that  nomi- 
nates the  Presidential  ticket.  The  Presidential  nominee 
harmonizes  and  expounds  party  opinion.  If  elected,  he 
is  recognized  by  both  parties  as  virtually  bound  to  carry 
on  the  affairs  of  the  country  in  accordance  with  the 
general  views  of  the  party  that  supported  him. 

But  while  it  is  thus  the  business  of  a  great  party  to 
formulate  views  of  public  policy,  and,  when  in  power,  to 
make  the  laws  and  administer  the  government  in  some 
manner  consistent  with  those  views,  it  is  also  the 
business  of  the  party,  for  practical  purposes,  to  con- 
cern itself  with  the  political  life  of  the  states,  the  counties, 
and  the  minor  political  divisions.  At  every  point,  from 
the  Presidency  down  to  the  petty  road  district,  as  our 
system  developed,  the  voluntary  organization  of  political 
life  found  itself  in  contact  with  the  official  business  of 
government. 


138    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

The  parties  were  organized  with  their  central  com- 
mittees corresponding  to  political  divisions.  The  national 
committee  was  made  up  of  a  member  from  each  state; 
the  state  committee  was  composed  on  a  corresponding 
plan;  and  for  lesser  territories,  —  congressional  districts, 
counties,  townships,  or  municipalities,  —  the  party  had  its 
organization,  represented  by  officers  and  standing  commit- 
tees. While  the  governing  work  of  counties  and  villages 
had  no  necessary  party  relationship  to  that  of  states  or  the 
nation,  the  tendency  to  use  party  machinery  in  the  selection 
of  local  candidates  and  the  carrying  on  of  campaigns,  was 
too  strong  to  be  successfully  resisted. 

Party  political  life  associated  itself,  in  the  nature  of  the 
case,  with  the  whole  structure  of  government  from  top  to 
bottom.  With  the  development  of  the  economic  and  pro- 
fessional life  of  the  country,  the  management  of  political 
machinery  tended  more  and  more  to  become  an  absorbing 
and  specialized  form  of  business.  With  a  million  or  more 
of  officials  to  be  chosen  by  popular  election,  and  many 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  places  to  be  filled  by  appoint- 
ment, —  all  the  way  from  a  cabinet  officer  or  an  ambassa- 
dor, down  to  a  policeman  or  the  janitor  of  a  school  build- 
ing, —  the  political  life  of  the  United  States  assumed  an 
exceedingly  practical  aspect. 

The  "outs"  wanted  the  offices,  and  the  "ins"  wished 
to  retain  them ;  while  from  a  variety  of  motives,  the  lead- 
ing spirits  in  the  business  of  politics,  whether  themselves 
office-holders  or  not,  desired  to  keep  their  places  of  influ- 
ence and  control  in  the  voluntary  organization  as  well  as 
in  the  official  business  of  government.  The  salaries  of  offi- 
cials and  the  other  expenditures  of  government  meant  the 
assessment  and  levying  of  taxes  and  the  collection  and  dis- 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS       139 

bursement  of  hundreds  or  thousands  of  dollars  in  the  small- 
est divisions,  of  scores  or  hundreds  of  thousands  in  the 
towns  and  counties,  of  millions  in  the  state,  and  of  hun- 
dreds of  millions  in  the  nation. 

It  is  not  strange,  then,  that  what  had  grown  to  be  so  vast 
a  business  undertaking  from  the  standpoint  of  personnel 
and  of  cost  as  the  carrying  on  of  government,  should  have 
resulted  in  the  development  of  a  professional  class  of 
politicians  whose  motive,  to  some  extent,  was  personal 
gain.  It  did  not  follow  of  necessity  that  this  was  their 
sole  motive,  or  that  they  pursued  it  by  corrupt  methods. 
But  it  is  obvious  enough  that  a  situation  of  that  kind  would 
at  times  offer  strong  temptations  to  those  seeking  to  gain 
or  to  retain  political  power. 

Furthermore,  as  the  country  expanded  in  wealth  and  in 
complexity  of  economic  life,  the  opportunities  of  private 
life  became  more  and  more  alluring  and  absorbing.  This 
fact  contributed  not  a  little  to  the  tendency  of  political 
life  to  become  professionalized  under  the  lead  of  men  not 
wholly  actuated  by  public  spirit. 

The  power  as  well  as  the  necessity  of  party  organiza- 
tion was  increased  not  merely  by  the  number  of  elective 
and  appointive  offices  and  the  elaborate  structure  of 
the  official  machinery  of  government,  but  also  by  the 
circumstances  which  had  tended  to  concentrate  the  hold- 
ing of  elections  upon  a  single  day.  This  concentration 
was  due  partly  to  reasons  of  public  economy  and  con- 
venience, and  partly  to  the  influence  of  the  professional 
politicians,  whose  control  was  better  assured  by  such  a 
method.  When,  on  the  same  Tuesday  in  November,  the 
citizens  in  a  given  voting  precinct  must  cast  their  ballots 
for  a  national  Presidential  ticket,  a  member  of  Congress, 


140    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

a  governor  of  their  state,  and  other  general  state  officers, 
judges  of  several  state  courts,  an  entire  set  of  county  offi- 
cers, and  various  municipal,  or  township,  or  other  local 
functionaries,  it  becomes  extremely  difficult  to  do  any- 
thing else  except  to  make  a  choice  between  the  long  line 
of  candidates  offered  by  one  party  and  the  long  line  offered 
by  the  other. 

Such  conditions  have  tended  to  strengthen  parties  and 
perpetuate  them,  through  their  control  of  the  organiza- 
tion, apart  from  which  political  life  has  had  no  full  and 
effective  means  of  expression.  Thus  we  have  found  a  very 
important  series  of  American  political  problems  arising 
from  the  tendency  of  the  mere  voluntary  organization  of 
the  political  life  to  become  obstructive  and  arbitrary. 
From  this  condition  has  arisen  a  series  of  efforts  to  reform 
the  machinery  and  to  secure  elasticity  and  freedom  for 
the  expression  of  the  will  of  the  democracy. 

The  deeper  remedy  for  all  such  evils  must,  of  course,  lie  in 
the  development  of  the  individual  citizen.  While  the  two 
great  party  vehicles  —  as  common  carriers,  so  to  speak  - 
may  compete  in  perpetuity  for  popular  patronage,  the 
individual  citizen  need  not  always  ride  in  the  same  wagon. 
The  "bolt"  has  always  been  recognized  as  a  party  cor- 
rective. The  more  valuable  bolt  is  that  which  is  due  to  the 
awakening  of  an  independent  mind  and  spirit  in  a  well- 
instructed  voter,  who  is  superior  to  the  average  of  char- 
acter, or  standard,  or  opinion,  that  controls  his  party  at  a 
given  moment. 

The  less  valuable  form  of  bolt  is  due  to  some  prejudice 
or  susceptibility  that  affects  races  or  classes  or  localities, 
whose  standard  is  lower  than  that  of  the  average  that 
dominates  the  party.  A  dozen  illustrations  of  both  forms 


THE   CITIZEN  AND   HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS        141 

)f  party  insurrection  will  readily  occur  to  any  one  familiar 
with  our  recent  politics. 

With  the  earlier  development  of  party  spirit  and  party 
organization,  there  appeared,  first,  the  theory  that  party 
solidarity  must  be  maintained,  and,  second,  the  practical 
consequence  that  party  divisions  were  carried  into  local 
elections.  In  rural  communities,  with  average  conditions 
of  intelligence,  it  was  easy  to  develop  the  habit  of  rotation 
in  office.  Public  duties  were  simple,  and  the  honors  and 
emoluments  of  office  were  distributed  not  merely  by  alter- 
nation between  parties,  but  also  by  brevity  of  tenure  and 
rapid  succession  within  the  ranks  of  a  given  party  organi- 
zation. 

Gradually  there  developed  also  in  the  holding  of  ap- 
pointive places  —  as  well  as  in  elective  ones  —  the  prin- 
ciple of  change  by  alternation  of  parties  and  of  further 
change  by  rapid  rotation.  These  principles  became  crys- 
tallized in  phrases.  The  party  principle  was  embodied  in 
the  assertion  that  "to  the  victor  belong  the  spoils."  The 
principle  of  short  tenure  and  rapid  succession  found  embodi- 
ment in  the  dictum  that  "we  must  have  no  permanent 
office-holding  class  in  America."  But,  as  the  country 
advanced,  and  life  became  more  intgnsg  and,  specialized, 
we  learned  that  the  spoils  system  and  the  rotation  system 
were  actually  creating  a  political  and  official  caste  or  class 
of  an  inferior  and  dangerous  political  type. 

Office-holding  and  office-seeking  began  to  dominate  party 
organization.  The  vast  expenditure  made  possible  by  the 
strife  of  parties  and  the  conduct  of  campaigns  was  largely 
turned  to  vicious  ends.  The  party  in  power  levied  assess- 
ments upon  all  office-holders  to  procure  funds  with  which  to 
contest  doubtful  states  or  districts,  or  smaller  divisions.  On 


142    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

the  other  hand,  the  candidates  of  the  opposition  party  for 
elective  office  and  the  aspirants  for  future  appointive  place, 
were  expected  to  provide  the  sinews  of  war  for  the  great 
contest  that,  if  successful,  would  admit  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands of  applicants  to  coveted  places  at  the  public  crib. 

The  Civil  Service  Reform  movement  made  its  way,  slowly 
at  first,  but  with  increasing  influence,  with  a  view  to  emanci- 
pate the  voluntary  political  life,  on  the  one  hand,  and  to  im- 
prove the  character  of  government  work  on  the  other.  From 
the  time  of  President  Jackson  to  the  time  of  President 
Grant,  the  office-seeking  influence  had  been  steadily  grow- 
ing, until  it  had  taken  on  the  dimensions  of  a  great  evil. 

I  am  dealing  with  these  questions  in  principle  rather  than 
in  detail.  The  purposes  of  government  in  America  have 
not  been  to  carry  on  all  sorts  of  elaborate  undertakings, 
but  rather  to  secure  freedom  and  to  provide  and  regulate 
conditions  under  which  the  private  enterprises  and  volun- 
tary relationships  of  human  society  might  develop  equitably 
and  prosperously.  Government  was  to  be  a  positive  force 
in  its  provisions  for  national  progress  and  the  permanent 
success  of  our  institutions.  But  otherwise,  the  functions 
of  government  were,  in  the  main,  to  be  of  a  negative  kind. 
Sentiment  was  against  the  building  up  of  highly  trained, 
permanent  administrative  services,  because  we  were  not 
accustomed  to  the  idea  that  the  business  of  government 
was  of  a  kind  that  required  any  such  system.  In  a  nation 
where  every  boy  was  familiar  with  the  use  of  the  rifle  and 
the  shot-gun,  we  were  disposed  to  rely  upon  the  quick 
improvization  of  armies,  in  case  of  need.  Our  regular 
army  had  been  reduced  to  a  mere  skeleton  for  use  as  a 
national  police  against  the  outbreak  of  hostile  Indians  in 
the  Far  West.  In  like  manner,  we  were  accustomed  to 


THE  CITIZEN  AND  HIS  PART  IN  POLITICS         143 

think  of  the  civil  tasks  of  public  employment  as  open  to 
everybody,  requiring  no  particular  training,  and  to  as- 
sociate office-holding  with  political  activity. 

But  even  with  no  radical  change  of  theory  or  practice  re- 
garding the  functions  of  government,  the  most  restricted 
forms  of  public  work  of  necessity  grew  elaborate  and  re- 
quired a  large  personnel  as  the  country  expanded.  The  great 
central  offices  of  administration,  like  the  Treasury  and  the 
Post-office  at  Washington,  required  thousands  of  clerks. 
The  post-offices  in  the  larger  cities  were  employing  hundreds 
of  carriers,  as  well  as  clerks.  The  custom  houses  and  the 
other  branches  of  the  revenue  service  were  employing  great 
numbers  of  men  whose  work  required  skill  and  knowledge. 

We  began,  furthermore,  to  discover  that,  however  far  in 
advance  of  Europe  our  development  of  a  great  equal 
democracy  might  have  gone,  Germany,  France,  and  Eng- 
land had  brought  order  and  system  into  their  administra- 
tive work,  with  many  resultant  benefits.  The  great  strug- 
gle to  overthrow  the  spoils  system,  and  the  history  of  the 
steady  development  of  the  merit  system,  are  matters  of 
familiar  knowledge.  I  mention  them  only  as  illustrating 
a  phase  of  political  life  through  which  our  democratic 
institutions  had  to  pass. 

I  may  add  that  a  reform  of  this  kind  also  illustrates 
another  sort  of  voluntary  political  organization,  apart  from 
political  parties,  in  which  American  citizenship  of  the  best 
type  finds  constant  opportunity  for  the  exercise  of  public 
spirit  and  the  expression  of  opinion  in  an  effective  way. 
The  National  Civil  Service  Reform  Association,  with  its 
state  and  local  branches,  was  in  a  position  at  all  times  to 
instruct  public  opinion  through  the  press,  to  urge  its  views 
upon  law-making  bodies  and  high  executive  officials,  and 


144    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

to  make  propaganda  within  the  lines  of  party.  Little  by 
little  the  reform  grew,  until  parties  endorsed  it,  Congress 
and  the  legislatures  were  willing  to  sustain  it,  and  high 
appointive  officers  welcomed  it  for  the  relief  it  afforded 
them  and  for  the  heightened  efficiency  it  brought  to  the 
public  service. 

The  spoils  system,  as  it  formerly  existed,  was  one  of  the 
chief  factors  in  our  political  life.  It  is  not  yet  completely 
eliminated,  but  it  is  no  longer  dominant.  Hundreds  of 
thousands  of  public  servants  in  the  United  States  —  federal, 
state,  and  municipal  — are  now  appointed  for  reasons  of 
fitness  and  retained  for  efficiency  and  good  behavior.  It  is 
now  contrary  as  well  to  law  as  to  public  sentiment  to  assess 
them  for  campaign  funds,  and  they  are  free  both  from 
the  fear  of  the  clean  party  sweep,  and  also  from  the  danger 
of  losing  employment  under  the  old  custom  of  quick  rota- 
tion in  office. 


VI 


FURTHER  PROBLEMS  RELATING  TO  PARTY  MACHINERY  AND 
THE  FREEDOM  OF  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION 

THE  business  of  politics,  as  carried  on  by  the  extensive 
groups  and  hierarchies  of  politicians  controlling  the  rival 
party  organizations,  had  become  accustomed  to  a  large  use 
of  money.  The  gradual  shrinkage  of  contributions  from 
the  contingents  of  office-holders  and  office-seekers  did  not 
seem  greatly  to  affect  the  prosperity  of  politics  as  a  leading 
American  industry.  The  machinery  of  parties  seemed  more 
powerful  and  more  permanent  than  ever,  and  there  was 
ample  evidence  of  the  abundance  and  constant  use  of 
money  in  carrying  on  this  political  machinery. 

It  was  further  to  be  seen  that  so  much  money  in  politics 
could  not  have  been  supplied  by  candidates  for  elective 
office,  nor  could  it  be  traced  to  the  voluntary  gifts  of  un- 
selfish and  devoted  party  members.  Party  machinery 
seemed  ever  more  rigid,  and  less  responsive  to  the  higher 
trends  of  public  opinion.  Party  platforms  were  of  such  a 
sort,  and  nominees  for  office  of  such  quality,  that  the  voter 
came  to  feel  that  however  excellent  our  democratic  institu- 
tions might  be  in  their  theory  they  were  somehow  clogged 
and  obstructed  in  their  practical  working.  The  thoughtful 
voter  seemed  to  be  limited  to  a  choice  of  evils.  The  pro- 
fessional element  in  the  parties  had  gained  too  firm  a  con- 
trol, as  against  the  ordinary  citizen,  usually  occupied  with 
his  private  affairs  though  enrolled  as  a  Republican  or  a 

L  145 


146    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Democrat.  The  local  party  members  who  worked  at  poli- 
tics as  a  trade  were  able  to  control  the  caucuses  and  pri- 
mary elections,  to  name  the  delegates  to  conventions, 
and  to  select  the  nominees  for  local  offices  and  for  the 
~**xlegislature  of  their  state. 

^There  had  grown  up  a  ramified  system  of  professional 
politics  in  each  party,  unaffected  by  the  play  of  public 
opinion,  and  evidently  under  direction  from  a  central 
This  development  of  our  political  life  came  to 
be  known  as  the  "machine''  or  "boss"  system.  From  a 
wholly  different  system  and  theory  of  party  leadership  and 
regularity,  there  had  developed  an  arbitrary  and  tyranni- 
cal organization,  never  exactly  alike  in  different  states,  yet 
similar  enough  to  be  characterized  in  the  same  sweeping 
terms.  It  simply  meant  that  the  organization  of  political 
life  had  been  seized  upon  by  private  interests,  for  private 
advantage,  whereas  the  original  and  natural  purpose  of 
political  organization  was  for  public  ends  and  for  the 
general  welfare?^ 

The  chosen  sphere  of  a  distinct  organization  under  the 
machine,  or  boss,  system  was  the  separate  state.  The  pri- 
vate interests  concerned  were  twofold,  namely,  those  of  the 
professional  political  class  itself,  which  directly  or  indi- 
rectly found  its  sources  of  livelihood  and  gain  in  the  con- 
trol of  politics,  and,  second,  the  large  private  interests  of 
various  sorts  which  could  be  so  harmed  or  so  benefited  by 
legislative  or  governmental  action  as  to  make  them  a 
growing  factor  in  political  life. 

f   The  country's  economic  activities   had  grown   to   im- 
/mense  proportions,  and  the  rewards  of  business  life  had 
''  drawn  away  thousands  of  men  who  otherwise  would  have 
been  available  for  public  service  or  for  the  quasi-public  life 


PARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION     147 

of  the  learned  professions.  These  business  activities  had, 
to  an  increasing  extent,  taken  the  form  of  joint  stock 
companies  or  corporations.  As  such,  they  were  the  crea- 
tures of  the  state  and  subject  to  its  regulation.  As  the 
cities  grew  in  population,  the  companies  that  held  fran- 
chises to  supply  light,  or  transit  service,  or  some  other 
form  of  local  need,  became  powerful  and  began  to  rank 
with  the  railroad,  telegraph,  telephone,  insurance,  bank- 
ing, and  other  large  corporations,  whose  methods  were 
subject  to  public  regulation. 

Obviously,  a  session  of  the  state  legislature  was  a  matter 
of  deep  concern  for  such  corporations.  In  the  earlier  stages 
of  their  interest  in  public  action,  they  were  represented  at 
state  capitals  by  agents,  sometimes  of  good  repute,  some- 
times of  bad.  To  obtain  a  law  that  they  desired,  or  to 
prevent  a  measure  that  would  injure  them,  they  were  pre- 
pared to  spend  money,  sometimes  in  good  faith,  sometimes 
corruptly.  But  as  their  interests  grew  in  magnitude,  the 
political  system  began  to  adapt  itself  to  a  changing  situa- 
tion. It  was  a  crude  and  dangerous  method,  as  well  as  a 
merely  stop-gap  and  temporary  one,  to  maintain  lobbies 
and  attempt  to  bribe  law-makers  at  the  seat  of  government. 
A  better  method  was  to  help  secure  discipline  and  au- 
thority in  the  political  organizations,  and  then  to  deal 
quietly  with  the  chiefs  of  a  professionalized  political  sys- 
tem. Thus  the  lobby  in  its  more  offensive  aspects  began 
to  grow  obsolete,  and  the  party  machine  became  a  thing  of 
method  and  discipline,  recognizing  some  form  of  autocratic 
leadership. 

The  machine  would  have  defeated  its  own  ends  if  it  had 
become  too  cynical,  or  too  intolerant  of  the  well-meaning 
members  of  the  party  who  still  regarded  the  structure  as 


148    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

capable,  from  time  to  time,  of  serving  useful  public  ends. 
The  machine  was  supplied  with  money  by  the  corporations 
and  various  private  interests,  seeking  either  favors  or 
immunity.  The  object  of  the  system  was  to  put  in  control 
leaders  who  knew  how  to  maintain  discipline  and  secure 
desired  results.  The  corporations  expected  no  accounting 
for  the  money.  As  a  rule,  it  took  the  form  of  unrecorded 
and  unacknowledged  party  campaign  funds. 

The  boss  or  central  authority  of  the  party  secured  such  a 
use  of  the  money  as  would  lubricate  the  machinery  and  give 
assurance  of  continued  control.  The  system  concerned  itself 
quietly  with  the  selection  of  candidates  for  the  legislature, 
and  supplied  them  with  funds  in  a  way  that  was  meant  to 
put  them  under  personal  obligation.  Country  newspapers 
were  subsidized  on  a  plan  that  was  carefully  intended  to 
be  flattering  to  their  usefulness  and  independence,  rather 
than  humiliating  to  their  self-respect. 

The  system  made  it  possible  to  give  such  attention  to 
details  and  such  forethought  to  every  phase  of  political 
life  that  the  control  of  caucuses  and  conventions  was,  under 
ordinary  circumstances,  fully  assured.  The  one  party 
could  not  be  used  to  expose  and  break  down  the  machine 
control  of  the  other  party,  for  the  obvious  reason  that  both 
were  in  the  same  condition.  They  were  supplied  with 
funds  from  the  same  sources,  and  were,  in  the  nature  of  the 
case,  bound  to  be  subservient  to  the  same  interests.  Thus 
it  would  happen  not  infrequently  that  a  state  legislature 
almost  equally  divided  between  the  two  parties  would  not 
have  one  member  in  twenty,  or  one  in  fifty,  whose  nomi- 
nation and  election  had  not  been  agreeable  to  forces  behind 
the  two  machines,  and  whose  legislative  action  could  not 
be  counted  upon  by  those  who  held  the  party  reins. 


PARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION     149 

Such  a  system  is  not  necessarily  one  of  deliberate  in- 
vention. It  is  the  growth  of  a  variety  of  conditions,  and 
many  of  those  who  are  most  obedient  to  it  do  not  under- 
stand the  nature  of  the  yoke  they  wear.  The  corrupting 
and  demoralizing  effect  of  these  methods  is  not  always 
perceived  at  first,  and  the  extent  of  their  harmful  working 
will  naturally  vary  in  different  states  according  to  circum- 
stances. It  is  probably  within  the  bounds  of  truth  to  say 
that  there  is  not  one  of  our  states  which  has  not,  to  a  very 
considerable  extent,  come  under  the  baneful  influence  of 
this  system,  by  means  of  which  the  political  life  of  the 
people  is  dominated  and  exploited  for  private  ends  by 
rich  working  corporations  in  alliance  with  professional 
party  politicians. 

I  am  not  discussing  the  question  whether  or  not  the 
corporations  desire  undue  privileges,  or  whether  their  par- 
ticipation in  politics  has  been  in  the  nature  of  a  defen- 
sive movement  against  unjust  and  hampering  restrictions. 
Readers  will  remember  that  my  theme  is  the  political 
life  itself,  and  that  I  am  discussing  the  methods  by 
which  the  citizen  operates  his  government.  And  I  am 
endeavoring  to  show  that  a  great  part  of  the  problem  of 
the  political  life  of  a  democratic  people  lies  in  their  keeping 
a  proper  control  over  the  means  by  which  they  may  get  at 
the  official  work  of  government  and  may  secure  and  main- 
tain the  freedom  and  elasticity  of  democratic  life. 

With  health  and  vigor  in  the  body  politic,  with  intelli- 
gence and  virtue  in  the  citizenship  of  the  country,  and  with 
a  press  not  wholly  controlled  by  private  interests,  the  reac- 
tion against  machine  politics  could  only  be  a  question  of 
time.  The  non-professional  political  elements  in  our  par- 
ties began  to  assert  themselves,  and  their  success  in  one 


150    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

place  emboldened  their  efforts  in  another.  Various  devices 
were  proposed  and  some  of  them  brought  into  effect  to 
weaken  the  control  of  professional  party  machines.  It  was 
evident  enough  that  the  holding  of  municipal  elections  at  a 
separate  time  would  make  it  far  easier  to  deal  with  local 
candidates  and  questions  upon  their  merits.  Thus,  many 
of  our  larger  cities  are  gradually  finding  a  free  political  life 
of  their  own,  not  wholly  detached  from  parties  and  their 
working,  but  no  longer  hopelessly  subjected  to  such 
machinery. 

/  The  use  of  an  official  ballot  paper  has  made  the  whole- 
/sale  bribery  of  voters  far  more  difficult  than  in  former 
I  times,  but  in  most  of  our  states  the  voting  paper  still  lends 
\  itself  too  much  to  the  purposes  of  party  machines  by  the 
arrangement  of  names  in  party  columns.  There  has  been  a 
great  growth  throughout  the  country  of  the  primary^elec- 
tiQD^syjtejn  as  a  means  by  which  to  enable  the  voters  of  a 
party  to  select  their  candidates  for  important  offices,  this 
being  regarded  as  a  remedy  for  the  evils  of  a  convention 
system,  controlled  by  the  professional  politicians.  To  give 
security  to  such  a  primary  system,  it  is  becoming  the  rule 
to  give  it  an  official  character  and  standing  by  enactments 
which  expressly  recognize  the  existence  of  political  parties 
as  a  part  of  our  governing  machinery.  It  remains  to  be 
seen  whether  the  voluntary  association  of  citizens  in  par- 
ties should  thus  come  under  detailed  regulation  of  law. 

The  essential  remedy  for  evils  in  the  practical  working 

/  of  politics  does  not  lie  in  the  change  of  systems.    In  many 

[  states  the  substitution  of  primary  elections  for  nominat- 

Vjng  conventions  may  have  excellent  results  for  a  time. 

It  remains  for  experience  to  improve  methods  and  to  change 

them  from  time  to  time.    The  real  remedy  lies  in  the 


PARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION     151 

awakening  of  public  opinion  and  the  political  assertion  of 
good  citizens. 

Many  states  have  passed  or  else  are  considering  laws 
regulating  political  expenditure  and  requiring  publicity 
as  regards  the  source  and  the  use  of  money  in  carrying 
on  elections.  There  is  also  a  movement  on  foot  which 
will  result  in  the  prohibition  of  political  contributions 
by  private  corporations.  The  collection  of  money  from 
corporations  was  very  large  in  the  Presidential  campaign 
of  1896,  and  it  was  excused  on  the  ground  that  the  business 
interests  of  the  country  required  the  defeat  of  the  free-silver 
movement.  Every  one  can  see  clearly  enough  now  that 
directors  and  trustees  should  not  have  appropriated  the 
money  of  stockholders  for  political  uses.  Laws  and  pub- 
lic regulations  affecting  these  matters  are  timely  and  to  be 
encouraged.  But  the  endeavors  to  enact  such  laws  are 
chiefly  important  for  what  they  indicate  as  regards  an 
aroused  public  opinion. 

The  alliance  between  corporate  business  interests  and 
professional  politics  cannot  be  wholly  broken  up,  because 
there  is  so  much  at  stake  for  both  parties  to  the  bargain. 
But  honest  and  public-spirited  politics  can  so  strongly  assert 
itself,  by  the  side  of  the  politics  of  private  interest  and 
profit,  as  to  restore  something  like  old-time  freedom  and 
elasticity  to  the  life  of  parties.  The  rival  organizations  are 
put  upon  their  good  behavior  by  the  great  growth  of  inde- 
pendent voting  and  by  the  new  vigor  of  those  men  in  both 
parties  whose  motives  are  public-spirited  and  whose  ability 
in  political  work  is  so  great  as  to  have  broken  the  spell  of 
professionalism.  It  has  become  the  fashion  to  make  more 
direct  appeal  to  the  people,  to  cultivate  the  plain  voters, 
and  to  break  down  the  tyranny  of  the  party  machines. 


152    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Along  with  the  movement  for  greater  freedom  in  the 
play  of  voluntary  official  forces  is  a  corresponding  move- 
ment for  a  more  responsive  and  elastic  character  in  the 
official  business  of  government.  It  is  natural,  when  the 
people  feel  that  the  bosses  and  machines  select  the  members 
of  the  legislature  and  dictate  much  of  the  work  of  the  law- 
making  bodies,  that  there  should  be  demand  for  methods 
to  secure  a  more  prompt  and  certain  expression  of  the 
popular  will.  Hence  the  movement  for  the  election  of 
United  States  senators  by  the  people ;  for  a  direct  popular 
vote  upon  various  measures  of  a  statutory  character  through 
constitutional  amendment;  and  for  direct  democratic  par- 
ticipation in  law-making  through  the  device  known  as  the 
"initiative  and  referendum." 

Although  a  vast  majority  of  the  people  of  the  United 
States  are  in  favor  of  the  direct  election  of  United  States 
senators,  it  is  almost  hopelessly  difficult  to  overcome  the 
inertia  that  stands  in  the  way  of  amending  the  federal  Con- 
stitution. Meanwhile,  many  states  are  adopting  methods 
of  one  kind  or  another  to  secure  an  unofficial  popular 
choice  of  senators,  and  the  force  of  public  opinion  is  com- 
pelling the  legislatures  to  ratify  such  selections. 

The  state  constitutions  are  no  longer  confined  to  a  brief 
setting  forth  of  the  organic  structure  of  the  state  govern- 
ment, but  contain  an  ever  increasing  number  of  provisions 
of  a  statutory  character  regarded  as  of  permanent  public 
importance.  Such  provisions  in  most  states  require  a 
cumbrous  process  for  adoption.  As  a  rule,  they  must  pass 
two  successive  legislatures,  then  be  submitted  to  the  people. 
In  spite  of  difficulties,  a  large  number  of  provisions  are  thus 
voted  upon  every  year  in  one  state  or  another.  Many 
states  require  the  submission  to  the  people  of  a  question 


PARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION     153 

involving  bonded  indebtedness.  A  recent  illustration  is 
afforded  by  the  vote  of  the  people  of  the  state  of  New  York 
to  spend  $100,000,000  upon  the  canal  system. 

There  is  an  increased  feeling  that  more  questions  of  pub- 
lic concern  rather  than  fewer  ought  to  be  submitted  to 
direct  popular  vote,  and  that  the  processes  should  be  sim- 
pler and  more  rapid.  In  Oregon,  where  the  usual  process 
of  amending  the  constitution  requires  five  years,  a  new 
alternative  system  has  been  put  into  effect  which  takes 
only  three  or  four  months.  A  given  number  of  voters 
may  initiate  an  amendment  to  the  constitution  by  send- 
ing a  petition  to  the  Secretary  of  State,  which  is  followed 
by  a  proclamation  of  the  governor  calling  for  an  elec- 
tion. 

In  1906  five  amendments  were  thus  offered  in  Oregon,  and 
four  of  them  were  adopted.  This  innovation  is  regarded 
with  so  much  favor  that  we  shall  probably  witness  a  con- 
siderable development  of  the  movement  for  giving  the  people 
a  quicker  and  more  direct  means  of  dealing  with  important 
matters  in  their  laws  and  constitutions.  While  this  move- 
ment is  upon  the  formal  and  official  side  of  government,  its 
chief  significance  lies  in  the  relation  it  bears  to  that  larger 
movement  —  chiefly  in  the  voluntary  and  unofficial  organi- 
zation of  politics  —  to  make  the  public  will  effective  and 
to  find  means  by  which  to  break  down  the  tyranny  and 
power  of  party  machinery. 

Obviously,  if  we  are  to  have  the  party  system  main- 
tained, it  must  be  made  truly  democratic  and  responsive. 
There  must  be  free  play  within  party  lines  for  those  whole- 
some and  normal  motives  which  make  the  political  life 
interesting  and  inviting  to  American  citizens  in  general. 
When  the  spoils  system  became  intolerable,  the  proper 


154    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

correctives  were  applied.  And  again,  when  party  organiza- 
tion and  work  become  too  much  a  separate  and  professional 
interest,  dominated  by  private  and  business  motives,  public 
spirit  becomes  aroused,  a  revival  of  genuine  political  life 
follows,  various  methods  are  found  to  weaken  machine 
control  and  liberate  political  life,  and  thus  normal  con- 
ditions are  once  more  in  control. 

/The  domination  of  the  political  life  of  the  country  by 
rigid  party  machines,  maintained  by  lavish  funds  exacted 
from  private  interests,  was  a  gradual  development  due  to 
complex  conditions.  That  being  true,  it  is  evident  that 
the  rescue  of  politics  from  that  form  of  tyranny  could  not 
be  accomplished  by  any  momentary  wave  of  agitation,  nor 
by  any  mere  device  or  concurrence  of  devices  for  the 
restoration  of  a  true  democratic  freedom. 

Yet  various  devices  will  have  been  found  useful;  and 
wave  after  wave  of  agitation  will  [have  been  salutary  in  a 
•feign  degree.  At  the  basis  of  everything  lies  the  general 
honesty  and  good  intention  of  the  people.  With  such  a 
basis,  the  reformer  in  politics  must  succeed  in  the  long  run. 
Devices  for  making  it  difficult  to  bribe  and  corrupt  the  more 
ignorant  mass  of  voters  will  always  help,  on  the  negative 
side,  that  good  work  of  the  more  positive  kind  which  con- 
sists in  the  efficient  training  of  the  children  for  citizenship 
and  in  the  use  of  all  sorts  of  agencies  for  the  advance- 
ment of  social  conditions. 

Devices  for  protecting  the  voting  system  are  of  great 
practical  use  when  they  coincide  with  popular  movements, 
courageously  led,  of  revolt  against  absolute  and  wanton 
tyranny  of  party  control.  Pennsylvania  affords  a  good 
illustration.  A  recent  correction  of  voting  methods  has 
brought  to  an  end  a  system  in  Philadelphia  under  which 


PARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION      155 

the  dominant  machine  could  maintain  itself,  at  any  moment 
of  peril,  by  casting  scores  of  thousands  of  fraudulent 
votes. 

This  improvement  of  machinery  will  be  of  inestimable 
value  in  the  future  political  life  of  that  important  state.  It 
could  not  have  been  secured  apart  from  a  general  agitation 
for  freedom  and  reform  in  politics.  Insurrection  against 
the  machine  and  boss  systems  was  needed  to  secure  the 
device  of  perfected  voting  arrangements,  while  the  oppor- 
tunity for  an  honest  casting  and  counting  of  the  votes  was 
necessary  in  order  to  give  revolt  from  party  tyranny  any 
fair  chance  of  success. 

A  period  of  extreme  subjection* to  the  party  system  in  its 
disciplined  and  professionalized  form  has  been  followed  by 
a  period  of  lively  revolt  within  party  lines,  and  of  attack 
from  without  by  associations  of  independent  voters.  These 
independents  have  been  able  in  most  states  to  secure  reason- 
able freedom  of  opportunity.  The  laws  now  make  it  pos- 
sible for  them  to  nominate  candidates  by  petition  and  have 
their  nominees  placed  upon  the  official  voting  paper.  Per- 
sistent work  on  the  part  of  the  professional  party  machines 
has  been  met  by  almost  equally  persistent  work  by  organiza- 
tions of  political  reformers.  These  groups  have  made  it 
their  business  to  expose  the  selfish  and  venal  practices 
resulting  from  the  alliance  of  private  interests  and  party 
machines,  and  to  work  unceasingly  for  particular  devices 
in  the  field  of  reform  methods,  or  for  the  general  freedom 
and  improvement  of  public  life. 

An  admirable  instance  of  such  work  is  afforded  by  the 
Municipal  Voters'  League  of  Chicago,  which  has  accom- 
plished much  not  only  for  the  betterment  of  the  govern- 
mental business  of  that  great  city,  but  also  for  the  improve- 


156    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

ment  of  the  politics  of  the  state  of  Illinois,  and  thus  for  a 
higher  tone  in  the  political  life  of  the  nation. 

For,  although  at  times  there  has  been  much  venality 
in  the  political  life  of  the  rural  neighborhoods,  especially 
in  New  York  and  the  Eastern  states,  the  worst  evils  of  the 
machine  and  boss  systems  have  been  intrenched  in  the 
great  cities.  It  has  been  evident  that  if  democratic  prin- 
ciples could  maintain  themselves  with  some  measure  of 
freedom  and  effect  in  New  York,  Boston,  Philadelphia,  Cin- 
cinnati, St.  Louis,  Chicago,  and  San  Francisco,  the  country 
as  a  whole  could  keep  its  faith  in  the  permanence  of  our 
American  institutions  of  self-government,  and  could  apply 
itself  with  confidence  to  the  correction  from  time  to  time 
of  such  evils  as  might  grow  up  with  changing  conditions. 

It  is  encouraging,  therefore,  to  note  the  fact  that  there 
is  great  vigor  of  democratic  life  in  these  fast-growing  cen- 
ters of  population.  Almost  countless  faults  of  political 
method  and  governmental  administration  can  be  found 
remaining  in  these  great  communities,  but  the  saving  feature 
of  the  situation  lies  in  the  fact  that  all  these  faults  are 
known,  exposed,  and  publicly  criticized  and  combated. 
However  great  may  be  the  faults  of  a  sensational  press,  it 
is  generally  to  be  found  ready  to  expose,  if  not  to  magnify, 
the  faults  and  scandals  of  a  professionalized  party  system 
and  a  corrupt  alliance  between  private  corporate  interests 
and  the  control  of  law-making  and  administration. 

Even  the  minor  parties  and  the  less  regular  movements, 
led  sometimes  by  fanatics  and  sometimes  by  demagogues 
—  not  excepting  the  coteries  of  extreme  Socialists  —  have 
a  certain  value,  because  they  are  to  some  extent  a  protest 
against  the  stifling  of  democratic  expression  by  the  machine 
control  of  the  great  parties.  They  are  compelled  to 


PARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION      157 

make  their  appeal  to  the  convictions  of  the  plain  citizen, 
usually  to  working-men  whose  political  education  they  are 
helping  to  promote. 

In  the  period  before  we  had  secured  in  the  great  cities, 
as  in  New  York,  a  concurrence  of  public  opinion  on  the 
one  hand  and  legal  devices  on  the  other,  to  protect  the 
ballot  box  and  make  certain  of  honest  elections,  the  political 
corruption  of  the  great  cities  endangered  the  working  not 
merely  of  local  institutions,  but  also  of  national.  For,  as 
I  have  already  remarked,  thr-rlifrwf  of  nur  political  Pivfit^rn 
lies  in  the  quadrennial  election  of  the  President,  and  our 
method  of  electing  a  President  puts  an  enormous  strain 
upon  the  working  political  machinery  of  a  few  of  the  larger 
and  so-called  " pivotal"  states.  This  is  particularly  true 
of  the  state  of  New  York. 

The  conditions  which  I  have  already  described  have  for 
a  long  time  made  it  reasonably  certain  that  in  presidential 
years  the  Southern  states  would  support  the  Democratic 
party.  It  has  been  less  certain,  but  fairly  probable,  that 
the  New  England  states,  Pennsylvania,  and  most  of  the 
Northwestern  states  would  be  carried  by  the  Republicans. 
Under  our  prevailing  system,  with  rare  exceptions,  each 
state  gives  its  entire  electoral  support  to  one  presiden- 
tial candidate  or  to  the  other.  Where,  on  account  of  its 
great  population,  a  state  has  a  large  number  of  electoral 
votes,  its  importance  in  the  presidential  year  is  obvious. 

Thus  the  state  of  New  York  has  a  larger  electoral  vote 
than  any  other,  and  its  party  complexion  has  usually  been 
regarded  as  doubtful  in  presidential  years.  It  is  divided 
between  two  almost  equal  bodies  of  population,  namely,  the 
four  millions  living  in  and  near  the  great  metropolis,  and 
the  four  millions  living  elsewhere  in  the  state.  In  normal 


158    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

presidential  years,  the  voters  of  the  metropolitan  district 
are  Democratic  by  a  great  preponderance,  and  the  voters 
of  the  rest  of  the  state  are  Republican  by  a  similar  majority. 
If  New  York  were  divided  into  two  states,  the  two  would 
be  practically  equal  in  electoral  strength;  the  one  would 
usually  be  Democratic,  the  other  usually  Republican ;  they 
would  offset  one  another  in  the  general  result,  — just  as 
Iowa  and  Kentucky  have  always  practically  offset  one 
another,  — and  thus  no  extreme  or  abnormal  pressure 
would  be  brought  to  bear  upon  the  political  life  of  New 
York  in  quadrennial  national  campaigns. 

But,  as  matters  have  stood  in  the  past,  a  result  affecting 
profoundly  the  country  as  a  whole  was  likely  to  turn  upon 
the  success  of  one  party  or  the  other  in  the  great  state  of 
New  York.  And  that  success  might  in  any  presidential 
year  turn  upon  the  count  of  a  single  ballot  box  in  a  small 
voting  precinct  dominated  by  a  Tammany  politician  in  a 
lodging-house  neighborhood  off  the  Bowery. 

The  great  contest  of  1876  between  Hayes  and  Tilden 
turned  upon  the  prevalence  of  fraud  and  corruption  in  the 
voting  machinery,  chiefly  in  several  reconstructed  Southern 
states,  but  also  to  some  extent  in  other  parts  of  the  country. 
This  strain  was  so  great  that  our  institutions  were  subjected 
to  a  serious  test.  We  were  in  some  danger  of  revolution 
from  what  was  then  called  the  "  Mexicanizing  "  of  our  forms 
of  government.  The  party  in  power  was  quickly  mobiliz- 
ing the  army,  and  the  party  out  of  power  was  threaten- 
ing a  £reat  volunteer  movement  upon  Washington.  The 
crisis  was  tided  over  through  a  practical  though  extra- 
constitutional  compromise,  and  the  result  was  accepted 
by  a  democracy  that  had  learned  the  need  of  some  forbear- 
ance and  patience  through  the  experience  of  a  terrible 


>ARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION     159 

Civil  War  brought  on  by  the  rashness  of  theorists  and  the 
narrow  selfishness  of  special  interests. 

Another  illustration  of  the  danger  of  imperfect  political 
machinery  came  in  the  great  campaign  of  1884,  which 
turned  wholly  upon  the  count  of  the  votes  in  the  city  of 
New  York,  or  the  metropolitan  district  in  general.  The 
balance  was  almost  even,  and  a  few  votes  either  way  would 
carry  the  entire  electoral  strength  of  the  Empire  state  to 
the  Republican  or  the  Democratic  side,  and  determine 
the  national  result.  The  Republicans  had  been  in  power 
at  Washington  since  1860.  It  was  an  intense  struggle. 
Apart  from  a  great  tide  of  genuine  political  sentiment  and 
party  feeling,  there  was  enormous  pressure  on  both  sides 
from  office-seeking  politicians  and  from  diverse  private 
interests.  Mr.  Blaine  was  defeated,  and  the  Democrats, 
under  Mr.  Cleveland,  came  into  power.  The  defeat  of  Mr. 
Blaine  was  at  the  moment  attributed  to  the  effect  of  an 
offensive  phrase  —  an  alliteration  coined  by  a  Protestant 
clergyman  —  which  offended  Catholic  voters. 

But  it  was  afterward  found  that  in  spite  of  the  clergy- 
man's tactless  remark,  Mr.  Blaine  would  have  been  elected 
but  for  ballot-box  frauds  perpetrated  by  a  politician  who 
in  due  time  languished  in  the  penitentiary  for  his  crimes. 
Republicans  at  that  period  believed  that  ballot-box  frauds 
and  similar  offenses  against  fundamental  political  honesty 
were  almost  wholly  confined  to  the  Democratic  politicians. 
The  Democrats  believed  that  bribery  and  the  improper  use 
of  money  were  essentially  Republican  offenses.  But  the 
plain  fact  is  that  we  were  living  through  a  period  of  corrup- 
tion in  our  politics,  from  which  neither  party  was  free, 
although  one  party  may  have  been  more  proficient  than 
the  other  in  particular  forms  of  wrong-doing. 


160    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

The  business  of  politics  had  been  absorbed  by  the  pro- 
fessional politician  and  office-seeker,  who  exploited  it  for 
purposes  of  gain.  Meanwhile,  the  economic  life  of  the 
country  had  grown  more  complex.  Business  interests  were 
passing  from  the  ownership  of  individuals  and  simple 
firms  and  partnerships,  to  large  corporations.  The  re- 
lationship of  political  life  to  economic  interests  was  taking 
on  new  forms. 

Hence  the  growth  of  professionalized  politics  and 
the  venal  alliance  between  political  machines  and  private 
interests.  And  hence  the  emergence  of  a  series  of  politi- 
cal problems  having  to  do  with  the  reassertion  of  hon- 
esty in  public  affairs,  and  the  rescuing  of  the  political  life 
by  the  citizens.  Resort  was  had  to  various  legal  devices 
and  particular  reforms  to  enable  the  people  to  liberate 
themselves  from  the  bondage  to  which  they  had  been  sub- 
jected under  the  guise  of  party  system  and  regularity, 
and  under  the  pretense  of  allegiance  to  great  principles 
and  policies  for  which  the  parties  professed  to  stand  as 
necessary  sponsors  and  guardians. 

One  needs  only  to  revert  to  the  struggles  of  1876  and 
1884  to  see  that  substantial  progress  has  been  made  in 
several  essential  directions.  The  civil  service  reformers 
have  won  their  case  in  theory,  and,  to  a  very  great  extent, 
in  practice.  The  reformers  of  ballot  methods  have  made 
enormous  progress,  so  that  the  grosser  frauds  that  once 
prevailed  in  New  York,  Boston,  Baltimore,  and  Chicago, 
are  eliminated,  while  even  Philadelphia  seems  to  have 
won  the  battle  for  real  and  honest  elections.  Both  great 
parties,  even  in  critical  elections,  expect  fairly  honest 
voting  and  counting  in  the  city  of  New  York. 

To  a  very  considerable  extent  municipal  elections  have 


PARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION     161 

been  made  separate,  so  that  they  occur  in  the  spring, 
or  else,  if  coming  in  November,  they  fall  in  years  when 
there  are  no  general  elections.  In  many  states,  more- 
over, the  more  important  elections  affecting  the  com- 
monwealth, as  for  the  governor  and  the  legislature,  are 
arranged  to  occur  in  the  years  intervening  between  im- 
portant national  campaigns,  as  for  the  presidency  or  for 
a  new  Congress. 

In  a  rapidly  increasing  number  of  states,  the  people  have 
insisted  upon  a  more  direct  control  of  party  methods  by 
substituting  primary  elections  for  the  time-honored  nomi- 
nating conventions.  The  great  number  of  states  in  which 
the  people  in  one  way  or  another  now  insist  upon  a  pre- 
liminary selection  of  United  States  senators,  illustrates  the 
many-sided  movement  in  progress  for  securing  to  the  ordi- 
nary citizen  his  share  in  the  control  of  his  party.  The 
better  public  opinion  of  the  state  is  learning  to  regulate  the 
selection  of  candidates  for  high  office,  in  order  that  the  voter 
at  the  polls  may  not  be  limited  to  a  virtual  choice  between 
two  sets  of  men  known  to  be  either  the  obedient  servants  of 
party  bosses  and  machines,  or  else  the  clever  agents  and 
tools  of  private  interests. 

With  the  complex  and  specialized  organization  of  party 
politics,  has  come  into  recognized  and  important  existence 
a  series  of  correspondingly  well-organized  movements  in- 
tended to  redeem  and  purify  politics  from  one  standpoint 
or  another.  And  concurrent  with  all  this  systematic  work 
to  improve  the  legal  and  official  devices  through  which 
democracy  expresses  itself,  we  have  been  witnessing  in 
state  after  state  a  wholesome  spirit  of  revolt  against  bosses 
and  their  corrupt  methods,  both  within  party  lines  and 
from  without.  This  great  struggle  for  a  free  democratic 


162    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

life  and  an  honest  government  is  far  from  being  ended,  and 
it  will  pass  through  many  successive  phases.  But  one 
reform  after  another  has  been  largely  gained,  and,  above 
all,  the  instrumentalities  of  reform  have  been  created. 

Public  opinion,  both  local  and  at  large,  has  been  wonder- 
fully developed  of  late,  for  improvement  and  progress  in 
political  methods.  The  public  schools  have  created  a 
nation  of  readers.  Newspapers  and  periodicals  have  been 
multiplied,  and  the  habit  of  newspaper  reading  is  almost 
universal.  Professionalized  politics  and  selfish  private 
interests  have  constantly  endeavored  in  all  sorts  of  ways  to 
administer  narcotics  to  the  public  through  a  subsidized 
or  controlled  newspaper  press.  Such  efforts  have  gone  far, 
but  in  the  main  they  have  failed.  In  a  country  where  the 
freedom  of  the  press  is  a  constitutional  prerogative,  and 
where  there  exists  a  public  and  general  interest  that  is 
distinct  from  the  aims  of  a  venal  politics,  the  press  will 
always  sooner  or  later  throw  off  its  trammels  and  serve 
public  as  against  private  ends. 

The  very  profession  of  journalism  makes  for  the  public 
point  of  view.  Even  the  party  newspaper  must  maintain 
its  measure  of  freedom ;  and,  if  trammeled  for  a  time,  must 
in  the  end  assert  its  normal  liberty  not  only  to  publish  the 
news,  but  also  to  represent  the  public  interest  and  to  com- 
bat the  forces  of  tyranny  and  of  wrong  in  politics  and 
government.  It  is  true  there  is  no  principle  or  motive 
working  automatically  to  bring  every  newspaper  or  periodi- 
cal into  the  service  of  good  government  and  a  free  democ- 
racy. Nevertheless,  in  a  country  of  wide-spread  popular 
intelligence,  there  is  a  demand  for  publicity  to  which  the 
press  must  respond  from  the  very  nature  of  the  case. 
And  in  the  service  of  this  right-minded  demand,  there  is 


PARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION     163 

always  a  tendency  toward  sound  working  opinions  about 
public  affairs  on  the  part  of  those  whose  business  it  is  to 
purvey  and  interpret  the  news. 

With  the  f^pansion  of  &*  ™ofrnpoiit.g.n  p,nd  1np.pl  n^w«- 
—papers  and  the  universal  habit  of  reading  them,  there  has 
also  grown  up  a  periodical  press  of  national  circulation, 
dependent  for  its  success  upon  the  belief  of  the  intelligent 
public  in  its  accuracy  of  statement  and  sincerity  of  view. 
This  larger  development  of  the  press  has  proved  to  be  of 
immense  power  not  only  in  .nationalizing  public 
but  also  in  synchronizing  discussion  and  agitation  for  a 
particular  reform  or  against  a  particular  evil  or  abuse. 
N.ot  to  mention  present-day  exponents  of  such  nationalized 
opinion  in  matters  of  politics  and  government,  it  is  enough 
to  call  attention  to  the  influence  of  the  New  York  Weekly 
Tribune  throughout  the  country  in  the  days  of  Horace 
Greeley,  or  to  that  of  Harper's  Weekly  under  the  editor- 
ship of  George  William  Curtis. 

[The  dissemination  not  only  of  the  local  newspaper  but 
also  of  the  periodical  detached  from  local  interest  and 
devoted  to  affairs  of  national  concern,  has  been  promoted 
by  a  remarkable  and  unique  policy  on  the  part  of  the  Ameri- 
can government.  The  Post-Office  Department  for  many 
years  past,  under  direction  of  Congress,  as  a  matter  of 
deliberate  public  policy,  has  delivered  newspapers  and 
periodicals  throughout  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  land 
at  a  uniform  rate  of  one  cent  a  pound,  regardless  of  the 
actual  cost  of  the  service.  It  has  further  promoted  the 
newspaper  press,  as  a  local  agent  of  public  opinion  and 
social  and  political  progress,  by  giving  it  free  distribution 
within  the  county  where  it  is  published.  And,  last  but  not 
least,  it  has  created  a  vast  system  of  rural  free  delivery 


164    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

of  postal  matter  which  carries  the  newspaper  and  periodi- 
cal into  the  homes  of  millions  of  scattered  farrherfc. 

A  public  policy  such  as  this  is  undoubtedly  susceptible 
of  serious  practical  abuse.  Yet  the  good  ends  that  it 
serves  are  so  vast  in  their  consequences  when  compared 
with  its  abuses,  that  this  postal  policy  must  stand  as  one 
of  the  great  monumental  landmarks  in  the  development 
and  maintenance  of  our  free  democratic  political  life. 

With  a  vast  continental  domain,  and  a  population  soon 
to  reach  a  hundred  millions  and  of  highly  diverse  origin, 
it  has  become  true  that  the  foremost  single  agency  for 
unifying  and  nationalizing  American  life  is  the  local  and 
general -press  ciL-tha-CQiiiitrjL  That  the  press  has  its  great 
faults  is  too  obvious  for  discussion.  The  food  supply 
may  be  imperfect  in  character,  and  the  air  we  breathe  may 
be  somewhat  contaminated,  but  we  must  have  our  supply 
of  food  and  drink  and  air,  nevertheless. 

In  like  manner  the  pr^ssserves  an  indispensable  need  in 
our  political  life,  and  the  public  policy  which  gives  it  free- 
dom, together  with  that  policy  of  government  which  pro^ 
motes  its  dissemination,  are  to  be  set  down  as  of  incalculable 
benefit  to  the  forces  that  are  keeping  alive  our  democratic 
institutions  in  their  original  purpose  and  pristine  virtue, 
while  modifying  their  working  from  time  to  time  to 
meet  the  changing  conditions  of  our  social  life. 
/"To  sum  up,  then,  this  stage  in  my  discussion,  we  seem  to 
/be  finding  the  necessary  solutions  for  the  problems  that 
lhave  grown  up  in  the  natural  course  of  our  development 
aue  to  the  increased  complexity  of  life,  the  necessary  pro- 
fessionalizing of  politics,  and  the  natural  pressure  of  large 
pecuniary  interests,  either  to  secure  political  favor  or  to 
escape  some  disadvantage.  We  shall  continue  to  have 


PARTY  MACHINERY  AND  DEMOCRATIC  EXPRESSION     165 

institutional  parties  and  professional  politicians.  But  they 
will  be  checked  and,  in  the  main,  controlled  by  the  great 
mass  of  citizens  who  obtain  their  livelihood  in  private 
pursuits,  yet  assert  their  right  to  a  part  in  the  normal  play 
of  political  life  and  force. 

Every  organized  interest  in  the  community,  whether 
economic  or  religious  or  of  other  character,  will  seek  to 
promote  its  special  views  and  interests  through  positive  or 
negative  political  action.  Thus,  in  one  way  or  another, 
the  great  business  corporations  will  continue  to  concern 
themselves  about  politics.  But  their  attempts  at  a  cynical 
control  of  the  practical  political  life  of  the  country  through 
their  financial  relations  with  the  bosses  and  machines  of 
both  parties  will  have  to  cease.  Their  partial  withdrawal 
from  politics  will  give  a  better  tone  to  our  public  life,  and 
this  better  tone  will,  in  turn,  relieve  them  from  the  more 
plausible  pretexts  upon  which  they  had  built  up  their  cor- 
rupt political  activity.  , 

For  it  is  obvious  that  the  corporations  had  been  the 
victims  of  their  own  system.  A  professionalized  political 
machine  which  could  render  improper  favors  to  business 
corporations  could  also,  in  turn,  threaten  them  and  black- 
mail them.  An  improvement  of  political  and  business 
morals,  making  for  a  better  social  equilibrium,  helps  the 
sane  and  sober  view  to  prevail,  and  tends  to  bring  divergent 
interests  together  on  the  simple  platform  of  fair  play  and 
justice  to  all  interests.  The  evolution  of  political  life 
must  proceed  in  a  certain  order.  It  was  necessary  that  we 
should  have  made  this  long  fight  for  the  purification  of 
politics  and  the  freedom  of  democratic  life  and  expression, 
because  of  the  new  tasks  to  which  the  agencies  of  govern- 
ment had  to  be  applied. 


VII 


PROBLEMS  OF   ECONOMIC   REGULATION,    ESPECIALLY    THOSE 
RELATING   TO   RAILWAYS  AND   TO    INDUSTRIAL   MONOPOLIES 

IT  had  been  from  the  first  a  fundamental  principle  of 
our  energetic,  self -directing,  and  capable  democracy,  that 
it  was  not  the  task  of  government  to  assume  the  functions 
of  the  economic  life.  We  held,  rather,  to  the  view  that 
government  should  regulate  conditions  in  such  a  way  as 
to  give  to  each  citizen  the  largest  range  of  freedom  and 
initiative  in  his  business  affairs  that  could  be  made  con- 
sistent with  the  like  freedom  of  his  fellow-citizens.  In 
order  to  maintain  this  cardinal  principle,  it  has  been  of 
ever  increasing  importance  that  government  should  main- 
tain its  unquestioned  supremacy;  that  it  could  be  relied 
upon  to  dispense  justice  with  reasonable  certainty  as  be- 
tween conflicting  private  interests;  that  it  should  be  able 
to  grasp  changing  conditions  and  show  a  firm  hand  in 
making  new  applications,  as  occasions  might  require,  of 
the  underlying  principles. 

At  the  very  outset  of  our  American  life,  it  was  the  busi- 
ness of  the  government  to  harmonize  conditions,  to  pro- 
mote the  general  welfare,  to  protect  liberty,  and  to  medi- 
ate between  conflicting  private  interests.  It  would  seem 
evident  that  these  aspects  of  our  governmental  life  and 
character  could  not  grow  less  important  as  our  economic 
life  became  more  complex,  and  as  private  interests  became 

166 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  167 

at  once  more  assertive  and  more  prone  to  conflict  among 
themselves.  And  if,  under  these  later  conditions,  any  group 
of  private  interests  should  have  fastened  its  clutches 
upon  the  political  and  governmental  machinery  for  its 
own  benefit  as  against  the  rest  of  the  community,  it 
would  seem  clear  that  government  must,  at  all  hazards,  free 
itself  from  such  control  in  order  to  carry  on  its  normal 
functions. 

A  large  part  of  that  recent  growth  of  opinion  in  favor  of 
extending  the  business  activities  of  government, — with  a 
view  to  the  public  ownership  and  operation  of  many  forms 
of  business  service  or  economic  production, — has  been 
due  to  the  belief  that  government  could  not  successfully 
regulate  private  activities  and  fix  the  rule  of  justice  as  be- 
tween conflicting  interests.  Regulation  of  economic  forces, 
for  the  general  welfare  and  for  the  largest  average  free- 
dom of  private  initiative,  is  the  accepted  American  policy. 
Absorption  of  economic  enterprises  by  the  government  itself 
with  a  view  to  a  higher  social  welfare  is  a  very  different 
proposal.  The  line  between  state  socialism  or  collec- 
tivism on  the  one  hand,  and  the  sphere  of  private  enterprise 
on  the  other  hand,  is  not  one  of  absolute  principle.  It 
may  vary -some  what  with  practical  experience.  But  it  is 
reasonably  distinct.  The  considerations  that  govern  pub- 
lic policy  in  such  matters  are  not  always  theoretical. 

Thus,  in  certain  European  countries,  governments  have 
come  into  the  ownership  and  operation  of  railroads  for 
reasons  quite  different  from  those  that  have  usually  been 
advocated  in  the  United  States.  These  European  reasons 
have  been  largely  of  a  military,  strategical  nature.  They 
have  also  been  found  in  the  fact  that  —  in  eastern  and 
southern  Europe  especially  —  public  initiative  was  more 


168    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

highly  developed  than  private  initiative,  and  the  only  way 
to  procure  a  system  of  railroads  and  telegraphs  was  to 
create  it  as  a  government  service,  or  else  to  allow  it  to  be 
exploited  by  capitalists  from  other  countries  on  disad- 
vantageous terms.  Our  country,  in  contrast  with  eastern 
Europe,  has  come  into  the  modern  facilities  of  life  with  a 
higher  development  of  private  than  of  public  business 
energy,  and  with  a  growth  of  private  capital  adequate 
usually  to  large  undertakings. 

When,  therefore,  men  have  argued  in  this  country  for 
governmental  operation  of  railroads,  telegraph  and  tele- 
phone lines,  and  services  of  local  transit,  they  have  not,  as 
a  rule,  complained  of  the  lack  of  such  modern  services  or 
of  the  insufficiency  of  private  capital  for  undertakings  of 
such  magnitude.  Their  argument  has  generally  admitted 
the  magnitude  and  adequacy  of  private  capital,  and  the 
great  energy  of  corporations  engaged  in  rendering  such 
services.  Their  complaints  have  been  of  a  twofold  char- 
acter: first,  that  private  interests  in  the  control  of  these 
enterprises  were  not  serving  the  public  fairly  and  impar- 
tially; second,  that  they  were  interfering  dangerously 
in  the  business  of  government,  all  the  way  up  from  the 
affairs  of  cities  and  local  corporations  to  those  of  states 
and  of  the  nation  at  large. 

Sometimes  there  are  great  enterprises  of  national  mo- 
ment that  private  capital  cannot  finance:  for  example, 
private  capital  found  it  impossible  to  construct  a  ship  canal 
either  at  Panama  or  across  Nicaragua,  and  it  was  only  after 
the  full  demonstration  of  such  failure  that  the  government 
of  the  United  States  undertook  to  provide  the  capital  for 
that  enterprise.  The  earlier  transcontinental  railroad  lines 
required  the  loan  of  public  credit  and  the  grant  of  lands. 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  169 

But  generally  speaking,  private  capital  and  energy  have 
sufficed  for  the  creation  and  carrying  on  of  all  large  business 
undertakings  in  America.  Some  railroad  lines  have  been 
projected  and  owned  by  states,  and  some,  either  partially 
or  wholly,  by  particular  cities.  But  the  uniform  practice 
has  been  to  turn  over  the  operation  of  such  roads  to  private 
companies;  and  the  later  tendency  has  been  to  transfer 
ownership,  also,  to  private  hands. 

In  the  period  of  rapid  westward  development,  both 
before  the  Civil  War  and  after  it,  the  demand  for  railroad 
facilities  was  insatiate  on  the  part  of  the  new  communities. 
All  sorts  of  public  and  private  subventions  and  subscrip- 
tions were  extended  to  the  promoters  of  new  railway  lines. 
The  railroads  in  turn,  having  been  built,  were  eager  for 
business  and  were  ready  to  offer  inducements  to  manu- 
facturers and  large  shippers.  Special  rates  were  promised 
to  those  who  would  locate  their  factories  or  warehouses 
along  the  new  lines,  and  railroad  agents  sought  both  freight 
and  passenger  business  by  constantly  changing  rates  to 
meet  the  competition  of  rival  lines.  It  was  a  speculative 
era,  during  which  railroads  from  time  to  time  went  into 
bankruptcy  and  submitted  to  processes  of  reorganization. 
It  was  inevitable  that  there  should  have  arisen,  finally,  a 
definite  conflict  of  interests  between  the  Western  railroads 
and  certain  classes  of  shippers. 

The  farmers,  for  example,  did  not  compete  with  one 
another,  but  had  a  definite,  common  interest.  The  differ- 
ence between  the  price  they  could  get  for  their  wheat  and 
the  quoted  market  price  at  Chicago  or  Liverpool,  repre- 
sented almost  exactly  the  price  per  bushel  exacted  by  the 
transportation  companies  for  the  service  they  rendered. 
The  position  of  the  farmers  was  favorable  for  a  contest. 


170    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

They  had  nothing  to  lose,  and  something  to  gain.  They 
were  the  most  powerful  element  in  agricultural  states  like 
Minnesota  and  Iowa,  and  they  proceeded  to  lay  stress  upon 
the  public  aspects  of  the  railroads  as  common  carriers. 
The  Granger  movement  and  the  anti-monopoly  movement 
in  Western  politics  in  the  early  seventies  and  in  the 
eighties  declared  it  to  be  the  right  of  government  to  fix 
rates  as  well  as  to  regulate,  in  other  respects,  the  busi- 
ness of  railroad  companies.  After  a  memorable  contest 
which  forms  another  great  landmark  in  our  political 
history,  the  railroad  policies  of  these  Western  states  were 
upheld  by  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States. 

With  the  development  of  the  country,  the  question  of 
excessive  rates  became  less  acute.  Contrary  to  their  ex- 
pressed fears,  the  railroad  companies  did  not  find  any  dis- 
position upon  the  part  of  the  states  to  use  the  rate-making 
power  in  a  confiscatory,  or  even  in  a  radical,  spirit.  Mean- 
while, the  railroad  systems  were  growing  more  extended, 
and  many  of  the  more  difficult  questions  of  regulation  lay 
outside  of  the  sphere  of  individual  states.  Then  was  called 
into  a  new  use  the  power  conferred  by  the  Constitution 
upon  Congress  to  regulate  commerce  between  the  states. 
In  this  respect,  as  in  many  others,  the  founders  of  our 
government  builded  better  than  they  knew.  They  had 
laid  down  a  broad  principle  capable  of  many  unexpected 
future  applications,  but  not  likely  to  be  invoked  for  im- 
proper uses. 

Surely,  one  of  the  chief  purposes  of  modern  government 
is  to  regulate  the  play  of  economic  forces.  The  states, 
respectively,  are  at  liberty  to  fix  the  conditions  under 
which  business  life  is  carried  on  within  their  borders.  But 
the  founders  of  the  general  government  were  creating  a 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  171 

great  nation  within  the  boundaries  of  which  there  was  to  be 
a  free  and  unhampered  economic  life.  Any  proper  regula- 
tion of  the  conditions  of  trade  and  commerce  on  the  inter- 
state or  national  plane  must  necessarily  belong  to  the 
national  government.  Such  a  power  would  have  belonged 
to  the  national  authorities  by  necessary  inference,  even  if 
it  had  not  been  expressly  conferred  in  the  Constitution. 

The  need  of  a  national  regulation  of  railroads  found 
definite  expression  in  the  enactment  of  the  original  Inter- 
state Commerce  Law  of  1887,  and  the  creation  of  the  Inter- 
state Commerce  Commission.  Besides  various  powers  of 
inquiry  and  regulation  conferred  upon  the  commission,  was 
the  power  to  declare  particular  rates  unreasonable,  subject 
to  a  final  action  by  the  United  States  courts.  The  law 
forbade  discriminations  in  rates  and  treatment  for  or 
against  individual  shippers.  It  undertook  to  protect  locali- 
ties against  harmful  treatment  under  its  famous  "  long  and 
short  haul"  clauses.  It  also  forbade  the  system  of  "pool- 
ing" which  had  grown  up  among  the  competing  trunk 
lines,  — a  method  by  which  they  had  endeavored  to  break 
up  the  ruinous  practice  of  rate-cutting,  and  to  remove  the 
pressure  of  competition  by  equitably  dividing  the  through 
business. 

The  private  rather  than  the  public  aspects  of  railroad 
investment  and  operation  had,  as  a  rule,  accorded  with 
the  American  way  of  thinking.  But  the  new  producing 
interests  of  the  West  had  forced  the  public  view  upon  the 
country,  had  carried  legislatures  and  federal  courts,  and 
had  at  length  secured  national  railroad  regulation.  Fol- 
lowing the  fight  for  reduction  of  excessive  rates  on  farm 
products,  came  that  for  fair  treatment  of  growing  towns 
along  the  railroad  lines  which  were  disadvantaged  by  the 


172    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

more  favorable  through  rates  accorded  to  the  larger  cen- 
ters where  railroad  competition  existed.  The  next  stage 
in  the  struggle  for  equitable  railroad  service  came  with 
the  demand  of  smaller  shippers  for  protection  against  the 
unfair  advantages  accorded  to  their  larger  competitors  in 
business. 

In  the  earlier  days,  every  manufacturer  or  more  extensive 
shipper  of  commodities  had  negotiated  for  as  favorable  a 
rate  as  possible,  and  favors  generally  took  the  form  of 
rebates  and  discounts.  The  more  important  the  shipper, 
generally  speaking,  the  larger  the  rebate.  The  system 
grew  up  naturally  in  the  process  of  creating  new  communi- 
ties. Favorable  rates  were  accorded  as  an  inducement  to 
locate  business  enterprises  along  a  given  line.  But,  as  the 
country  matured,  the  system  became  intolerable.  It  was 
extremely  difficult  to  bring  railroad  men  to  the  perception 
of  the  fact  that  their  business  was  not  a  private  one  in  the 
sense  of  justifying  these  discriminations.  After  stringent 
state  and  national  laws  had  been  enacted,  the  discrimina- 
tions were  continued  in  secret  ways  and  by  all  sorts  of 
indirect  and  evasive  practices.  The  large  shippers  had 
grown  so  powerful  in  many  cases  that  they  were  in  a  posi- 
tion to  make  threats,  if  not  absolutely  to  dictate  terms. 

The  practice  of  favoritism,  furthermore,  had  so  blunted 
the  moral  perception  of  the  average  railroad  official,  that 
it  became  a  somewhat  usual  practice  for  officers  and 
others  connected  with  the  management  of  railroads  to 
hold  stock  in  coal  mines,  grain  elevator  lines,  and  various 
other  enterprises,  which  they  were  able  to  serve  to  great 
advantage,  not  only  by  the  granting  of  better  rates  than 
were  given  to  competing  businesses,  but  also  by  a  prompt 
supply  of  cars  and  facilities,  whereas  competitors  were 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  173 

subject  to  delay  and  neglect.  This  practice  on  the  part 
of  railroad  men  of  turning  aside  from  their  strict  duties  as 
common  carriers  in  order  to  traffic  in  the  commodities 
handled  by  their  roads,  could  but  lead  to  a  further  loss 
of  moral  perception;  and  the  same  set  of  officials  fell 
into  a  series  of  practices  distinctly  harmful  to  their  own 
stockholders. 

Thus,  in  many  instances,  they  detached  more  profitable 
forms  of  traffic  from  the  general  business  of  the  company 
and  carried  them  on  by  means  of  so-called  "fast  freight 
lines,"  in  which  they  themselves  held  the  stock.  They 
set  up  separate  interests  in  terminal  facilities  here  and  there ; 
they  built  short  lines  of  railway  as  so-called  "feeders"  and 
sold  them  to  the  main  company  at  a  private  profit.  In  a 
variety  of  other  ways,  they  managed  to  deprive  the  stock- 
holders of  the  road  of  benefits  which,  under  strictly  honor- 
able management,  should  have  been  theirs. 

Meanwhile,  the  opportunities  afforded  by  rebates  and 
discriminations  in  favor  of  large  shippers  had  been  pro- 
ducing their  natural  effects.  In  a  country  so  vast  as  ours, 
with  such  abundance  and  variety  of  resources,  there  was 
needed  no  extraordinary  business  acumen  to  develop  enter- 
prises upon  a  vast  scale,  if  conditions  in  a  given  case  were 
so  favorable  as  to  put  all  competitors  at  a  serious  disad- 
vantage. A  protective  tariff  which  kept  rates  so  high  as  to 
prohibit  effective  outside  competition  in  many  lines  of  pro- 
duction, might,  indeed,  have  been  favorable  to  the  develop- 
ment of  domestic  monopoly  in  some  cases.  But  the  tariff 
could  not  ordinarily  affect  the  conditions  of  competition 
among  home  producers.  There  were  many  iron-masters 
in  the  land  benefited  alike  by  the  protective  tariff.  If  a 
few  iron-masters  grew  enormously  rich  because  they  were 


174    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

able  to  take  orders  for  railroad  iron  and  other  supplies  at  a 
price  lower  than  their  competitors  could  make,  there  must 
have  been  some  other  reason  for  it.  There  were  many 
prosperous  refiners  of  petroleum,  and  the  oil  fields  were 
somewhat  widely  scattered.  If  one  company  or  amalgama- 
tion was  able  to  drive  competitors  out  of  business  and  by 
degrees  control  the  whole  field,  where  the  more  obvious 
conditions  of  supply  and  distribution  were  so  simple,  and 
where  no  patented  invention  or  peculiar  skill  of  industrial 
process  was  involved,  there  must  have  been  a  reason  in 
the  nature  of  some  marked  special  advantage. 

It  seems  to  be  a  matter  of  history,  disputed  by  nobody, 
that  certain  firms  or  companies  in  the  early  seventies  had 
bargains  with  leading  railroads  which  gave  them  rates 
from  25  to  50  per  cent  less  than  those  accorded  to  smaller 
competitors.  Doubtless,  they  were  able  business  men 
who  could  have  secured  these  advantages  in  a  period 
when  everybody  was  bargaining  for  rates  and  obtaining 
ah1  the  privileges  possible.  It  is,  nevertheless,  a  fact  be- 
yond dispute  that  the  vast  development  of  the  business  of 
so-called  trusts  owed  much  to  enormous  advantages  in 
the  shipment  of  their  commodities. 

It  is  far  from  my  purpose  to  say  these  things  in  the 
spirit  of  an  indictment  against  those  who  benefited  by 
these  incalculable  railroad  advantages.  The  sovereigns 
of  European  states  in  earlier  periods  were  accustomed  to 
grant  certain  monopoly  privileges  to  subjects  who  had  won 
their  favor.  But  never  in  all  human  history  were  any  such 
priceless  monopoly  privileges  conferred  upon  any  man  or 
any  company  of  men  as  when  the  railroads  of  this  con- 
tinental republic  gave  favors  which  enabled  particular 
groups  or  individuals  to  command  the  fields  of  supply,  to 


l 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  175 

fix  wholesale  and  retail  prices,  and  to  control  the  consum- 
ing markets  for  various  articles  which  came  into  universal 
use.  This  obviously  applies  to  commodities  like  petro- 
leum and  anthracite  coal. 

It  is  equally  plain  that  men  dealing  in  iron  and  steel 
products  in  that  earlier  period  could  lay  the  foundation  of 
great  fortunes  if  they  were  lucky  enough  to  secure  better 
shipping  arrangements  than  their  competitors.  Again,  it 
requires  no  unusual  acumen  to  perceive  that  stupendous 
organizations  and  vast  fortunes  could  have  been  built  up 
by  firms  and  companies  which  acquired  a  practical  control 
of  the  great  business  of  buying  and  slaughtering  Western 
cattle  and  hogs  and  distributing  meat  products,  where  the 
railroad  rates  were  decidedly  in  their  favor  and  they  were 
allowed,  in  addition,  to  operate  their  own  lines  of  cars. 

The  companies  that  were  authorized  to  establish  systems 
of  grain  elevators, — with  warehouses  at  every  station  for 
hundreds  of  miles  through  a  country  devoted  to  wheat  and 
other  cereals, — aided  by  low  rates  and  a  constant  supply 
of  cars,  were  assuredly  in  a  position  to  establish  a  profitable 
monopoly.  The  relation  of  railroads  to  the  anthracite  coal 
district  of  Pennsylvania  and  to  certain  bituminous  coal 
districts  elsewhere,  afforded  further  instances  of  a  discrimi- 
nating system  which  it  is  not  my  purpose  to  illustrate 
exhaustively. 

I  am  presenting  these  matters  in  their  bearing  upon  the 
problems  of  American  politics.  Railway  discrimination, 
perhaps,  more  than  any  other  circumstance,  created  the 
larger  business  enterprises  of  a  more  or  less  monopolistic 
character,  popularly  known  as  trusts  and  combinations.  In 
any  case  we  should  have  had  a  vast  business  development, 
with  many  large  individual  undertakings,  by  reason  of  the 


176    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

greatness  of  the  country  and  the  magnitude  of  its  oppor- 
tunities. It  was  railroad  favors,  however,  more  than 
anything  else,  that  enabled  a  particular  combination  here 
and  there  to  assume  undue  proportions  and  to  absorb  its 
competitors  or  even  to  destroy  them,  in  a  period  when 
otherwise  they  could  all  have  carried  on  a  profitable  busi- 
ness. 

The  two  questions  of  railroad  control  and  the  checking 
or  regulation  of  industrial  monopoly  have  made  their  way 
in  very  close  association  with  one  another.  It  was  as  a 
result  of  public  investigations  of  the  Standard  Oil  Com- 
pany and  other  large  enterprises  that  the  Interstate  Com- 
merce Act  of  1887  was  followed  by  the  Sherman  Anti-Trust 
Law  of  1890.  Both  of  these  conspicuous  enactments  were 
intended  to  have  an  effect  upon  railroad  management  and 
upon  the  monopolistic  tendency  of  industry  and  trade. 
The  trusts  and  combinations,  however,  were  growing  so 
powerful  and  so  rich  that  they  were  putting  their  surplus 
capital  into  railroad  investments,  and  their  leading  spirits 
were  becoming  railroad  directors.  A  condition  had  grown 
up  which  was  making  it  difficult  to  force  the  railroads  into 
compliance  with  the  spirit  and  intent  of  the  laws  requiring 
them  to  render  impartial  service  to  all  their  patrons. 

Meanwhile,  the  situation  was  assuming  unexpected  phases 
through  court  interpretations  and  through  the  character 
of  the  more  or  less  spasmodic  efforts  of  executive  officers  to 
enforce  the  laws.  The  Sherman  Anti-Trust  Law  had  for- 
bidden agreements  in  restraint  of  trade.  The  courts  de- 
cided that  this  forbade  even  a  useful  kind  of  understanding 
between  railroads  to  maintain  reasonable  and  standard 
rates  and  to  serve  the  public  beneficially.  The  effect  of 
the  two  laws  taken  together  was  to  cause  the  railroads 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  177 

to  create  a  so-called  " community  of  interest"  by  making 
joint  investment  in  competing  lines  and  in  other  ways. 
And,  in  a  series  of  rapid  developments,  many  hundreds  of 
separate  railroad  companies  and  lines  became  fused  into 
a  half-dozen  great  financial  and  operating  systems,  each 
falling  under  the  direction  and  control  of  one  so-called 
"magnate"  or  else  of  a  small  group  of  men. 

In  its  fundamental  nature,  the  transportation  business 
is  only  to  a  very  limited  extent  competitive.  From  the 
earliest  times,  the  principles  affecting  common  carriers  have 
been  those  of  an  equal  and  fair  treatment  of  the  public,  with 
an  appropriate  and  decent  quality  of  service  at  standard 
and  reasonable  prices.  A  certain  possibility  of  competition, 
direct  or  indirect,  must  evidently  have  a  wholesome  effect 
upon  the  business  of  the  common  carrier,  in  that  it  stimu- 
lates his  energy  to  the  end  of  a  more  efficient  rendering 
of  public  service.  But  since  the  public  interest  in  the 
business  of  transportation  is  always  greater  and  more  es- 
sential than  any  private  interest,  it  is  both  right  and  neces- 
sary that  there  should  be  direct  public  supervision  and 
regulation. 

For  a  time  there  was  confusion  in  the  public  mind  and  a 
determination  to  break  up  large  railroad  systems  into  their 
constituent  parts,  and  to  compel  them  by  due  process  of 
law  to  set  themselves  into  competitive  array,  and  thereby 
the  better  to  serve  the  people  who  patronized  them.  Even 
the  judges  who  wrote  opinions  in  railroad  cases  were  evi- 
dently affected  by  this  notion  that  an  earlier  sort  of  compe- 
tition could  be  made  to  work  effectively  as  against  the  later 
principles  of  unity  and  harmony.  But,  in  the  main,  that 
idea  has  lost  its  hold  upon  the  minds  of  more  thoughtful 
men.  The  regulative  power  of  government  must  apply 


178    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

directly,  in  order  to  see  that  all  interests  are  fairly  served 
by  the  great  highways  of  travel  and  trade. 

At  times  there  have  been  complaints  of  particular  rates 
whether  for  passengers  or  certain  classes  of  freight,  as  ex- 
cessive. But,  in  general,  American  railroad  rates  have  not 
been  regarded  as  so  high  upon  the  average  as  to  place  a 
harmful  tax  upon  the  larger  movements  of  trade.  The 
great  effort  of  the  leaders  who  have  sought  through  politics 
and  government  to  regulate  the  railroads,  has  been  directed 
toward  securing  an  impartial  service.  In  view  of  the  more 
recent  development  of  large  systems,  and  the  disappearance 
of  certain  phases  of  competition,  it  has  also  become  a 
leading  object  of  public  regulation  to  secure  an  ample  and 
efficient,  as  well  as  an  impartial,  service.  Further  than  that, 
it  is  a  recognized  function  of  government  in  its  relation  to 
railroads  to  promote  the  safety  of  the  traveling  public  and 
of  employees  by  compelling  the  less  careful  and  enterprising 
companies  to  adopt  the  methods  and  standards  of  the  more 
advanced,  in  the  use  of  safety  appliances  and  in  the  treat- 
ment of  employees  as  respects  their  hours  of  labor  and  their 
protection  against  needless  accident. 

In  the  course  of  the  long  struggle  for  the  public  regula- 
tion of  railroads,  it  is  natural  enough  that  all  interests  con- 
cerned should  have  formed  themselves  into  compact  groups 
with  a  view  to  participation  in  political  life.  The  farmers 
in  the  seventies  and  eighties  were  able  to  enforce  their  de^ 
mands  because  of  the  absolute  solidarity  of  their  interests  and 
the  definiteness  and  simplicity  of  their  aims.  Through  the 
Granger  movement  and  other  organizations  they  controlled 
legislatures  and  brought  a  pressure  to  bear  that  was  some- 
times unduly  hostile  against  the  transportation  companies, 
by  virtue  of  whose  enterprise  the  Western  agricultural 


CONTROL  OP  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  179 

communities  had  been  created.  The  railroad  interests,  in 
turn,  became  a  powerful  factor  in  political  life.  They  were 
in  position  to  retain  the  services  of  influential  lawyers  in 
every  county  of  the  Western  states,  and  through  a  liberal 
policy  in  the  granting  of  free  passes  and  the  placing  of 
advertising  they  learned  how  to  acquire  a  considerable 
influence  over  the  local  newspapers. 

As  political  life  and  work  tended  to  become  systematized 
in  party  machines,  the  railroad  interests  learned  to  organize 
their  own  well-paid  political  agencies  for  service  in  the  odd 
years  as  well  as  in  election  years.  And  since  professional- 
ized politics  is  based  upon  money,  the  railroads  learned 
how  to  maintain  close  relations  with  the  dominant  party 
machines. 

The  motives  of  railroad  capitalists  in  their  political 
activities  were  not  necessarily  corrupt.  They  felt  that 
hostile  interests  were  organized  to  tax  railways,  to  lower 
rates,  to  make  vexatious  exactions,  and,  sometimes,  to 
levy  blackmail.  Not  only  the  great  agricultural  organiza- 
tions, but  also  the  labor-unions  were  in  position  to  attack 
corporations  by  political  methods.  The  general  public, 
consisting  of  the  ordinary  travelers  and  the  ordinary  ship- 
pers, being  largely  dependent  upon  railroads,  were  naturally 
critical  and  ready  to  make  demands  of  one  kind  and  another 
upon  the  railroad  managers.  The  railroads'  own  employees 
were  organized  in  compact  groups  and  able  to  exert  politi- 
cal influence  at  critical  moments  of  dispute  with  their  em- 
ployers. 

What,  under  these  complicated  conditions,  is  the  true  func- 
tion and  the  practical  duty  of  government  in  the  American 
state  and  nation  ?  There  are  to-day  great  leaders  of  popu- 
lar opinion  and  party  organization  who  declare  that  there 


180    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

is  no  solution  of  the  railroad  question  short  of  a  revolu- 
tionary change  of  policy  as  respects  the  scope  of  govern- 
ment. They  hold  that  the  nation  itself  must  acquire  and 
operate  the  interstate  network  of  railroads,  and  that  the 
states  must  acquire  and  operate  the  local  branches  and 
minor  network  of  roads  connecting  with  the  great  lines. 
Against  this  doctrine  of  innovation  — with  its  hundreds  of 
thousands,  perhaps  millions,  of  adherents  —  there  are  two 
distinct  forms  of  political  opposition. 

One  of  these  forms  is  based  upon  the  view  that  the  rail- 
road business  is  essentially  private,  that  government  should 
let  it  alone,  and  that  the  best  ends  of  American  economic 
life  will  be  served  by  leaving  economic  forces  unrestricted. 
This  is  the  view  of  the  railroad  owners  and  managers  them- 
selves, together  with  that  of  the  trusts  and  corporations; 
and  it  is  supported  either  openly  or  secretly  by  groups  of 
politicians,  regardless  of  party,  who  have  found  the  alli- 
ance between  politics  and  corporations  a  profitable  one  for 
their  own  purposes. 

The  other  opposing  view  holds  fast  to  the  doctrine  that 
railroads  are  necessary  public  highways,  the  impartial  use 
of  which  must  be  maintained,  but  that  the  practical  business 
of  operating  railroads  belongs  in  the  domain  of  private 
enterprise.  With  this  view  is  associated  the  idea  that  a 
quasi-public  service  of  universal  importance  requires  pub- 
licity in  its  financial  transactions  as  well  as  in  its  operating 
methods.  Since  railroads  are  granted  franchises  to  per- 
form a  public  service,  and  are  accorded  a  limited  power  of 
eminent  domain,  it  is  held  that  government  may  justly 
supervise  them  to  the  end  that  they  shall  perform  well  the 
services  for  the  sake  of  which  they  were  chartered. 

In  detail  these  tasks  of  public  regulation  are  difficult. 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  181 

They  can  never  be  performed  in  a  perfect  way.  But  it  is 
to  be  remembered  that  the  margin  of  difference  within 
which  government  has  to  operate  is  usually  narrow,  be- 
cause of  the  balancing  of  natural  forces  in  the  business 
world.  As  a  matter  of  practice,  it  has  been  found  that 
government  does  not  need  to  play  an  arbitrary  role  with 
respect  to  the  fixing  of  rates;  that  it  has  only  to  enforce 
the  reasonable  standards  of  civilized  life  in  its  demand  for 
safety  appliances;  and  that  in  its  endeavor  to  abolish  the 
evils  of  rebating  and  discrimination,  it  is  only  lending  its 
aid  to  those  evolving  forces  of  a  maturing  business  life 
which,  in  any  case,  must  have  found  that  a  fair  and  impar- 
tial treatment  of  all  shippers  comes  in  the  end  to  be  a 
necessity  from  every  standpoint. 

I  am  well  aware  that  in  the  very  statement  I  have  made 
of  the  opposing  views,  I  have  revealed  my  own  opinions. 
Recent  legislation  has  increased  the  power  and  authority 
of  the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission,  and  there  is  evi- 
dence of  a  greatly  enhanced  activity  on  the  part  of  railroad 
commissions  in  many  of  the  states.  There  would  seem  no 
good  reason  to  believe  that  the  final  triumph  of  govern- 
ment in  its  determination  to  regulate  railroads  in  the 
public  interest,  would  be  otherwise  than  beneficial,  in  the 
long  run,  to  all  the  various  interests  whose  rights  are  con- 
cerned and  who  must  look  to  government  as  the  final 
arbiter.  National  charters  to  interstate  railways,  with  na- 
tional control  of  new  issues  of  stocks  and  bonds,  are  quite 
as  desirable  for  all  concerned,  —  including  the  railway  com- 
panies themselves,  —  as  the  power  to  regulate  rates. 

It  is  one  thing  to  check  abnormal  tendencies,  and  to  help 
maintain  a  true  balance  between  diverse  social  and  busi- 
ness interests,  and  a  wholly  different  thing  to  absorb  any 


182    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

of  those  interests  for  public  exploitation.  That  the  Ameri- 
can people  could,  if  they  chose,  turn  their  government  into 
a  vast  public-service  corporation  for  the  carrying  on  of  the 
railroad,  the  telegraph,  the  telephone,  and  other  businesses 
necessary  to  the  general  welfare,  I  have  no  doubt.  Gov- 
ernment ownership  might  to  some  extent  relieve  the 
political  life  from  a  commercialized  and  a  corrupting 
tendency. 

It  is  conceivable,  indeed,  that  government  could  operate 
a  few  essentially  public  services,  which  are  fundamental  to 
other  business  enterprises,  and  go  no  further.  It  could  so 
exploit  them  as  to  favor  the  general  freedom  of  economic 
opportunity  and  to  promote  the  diffusion  rather  than  the 
concentration  of  wealth.  But  with  all  its  merits,  our  gov- 
ernment is  not  as  yet  a  successful  business  agency.  It 
ought  not  to  operate  railroads  if  private  enterprise  can  and 
will  operate  them  efficiently  and  impartially. 

It  is  often  the  case  that  great  reforms  come  about  of 
themselves  in  the  mere  fullness  of  time  through  the  ripen- 
ing of  conditions.  Action  is  followed  by  reaction.  Exces- 
sive immigration  finds  its  own  natural  check  at  the  very 
moment  when  we  are  about  to  put  up  the  barriers.  The 
worst  evils  of  railway  mismanagement  are  tending  to  dis- 
appear through  the  cooperation  of  all  forces,  public  and 
private.  The  railroad  companies  do  not  wish  to  play  a 
losing  game  in  politics,  and  they  are  ready  to  meet  their 
adversaries  fully  halfway  on  a  platform  of  fair  treatment 
to  every  interest.  As  for  the  trusts  and  corporations,  they 
have  made  complete  surrender  as  respects  unfair  railroad 
advantages. 

The  true  policy  of  government  in  its  dealing  with  these 
industrial  undertakings  of  national  and  international  scope, 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  183 

must  be  worked  out  in  the  light  of  experience.  Mr.  Bryan 
and  his  adherents  declare  that  every  large  business  corpora- 
tion of  a  monopolistic  character  must  be  destroyed.  The 
existing  law  forbids  combinations  in  restraint  of  trade. 
Since  few  of  the  great  trusts  and  corporations  occupy  the 
entire  field,  the  public  attitude  toward  them  must  depend 
to  some  extent  upon  their  real  conduct  toward,  and  effect 
upon,  other  corporations  or  other  individuals  engaged  in 
like  forms  of  business. 

It  is  clear  that  there  must  be  large  knowledge  of  the 
working  of  these  newer  forms  of  business  activity.  I  must, 
therefore,  call  attention  to  the  creation  of  the  Department  of 
Commerce  and  Labor,  with  its  investigating  Bureau  of 
Corporations,  in  the  year  1903,  as  another  landmark  in 
our  political  history.  It  is  the  growing  opinion  that  the 
government  should  not  only  have  the  power  to  investigate 
the  methods  of  great  corporations  doing  an  interstate  busi- 
ness, and  to  prosecute  them  where  they  oppress  or  restrain 
others  in  legitimate  business  enterprises,  but  that  it  should 
also  be  able  to  enforce  a  more  complete  publicity  in  respect 
to  their  corporate  finances  and  their  general  methods,  and 
that  through  some  form  of  national  licensing  or  incorpora- 
tion, it  should  be  better  able  to  supervise  them  as  large 
factors  in  national  commerce. 

Competition  will  long  remain  as  a  powerful  stimulus  in 
the  economic  sphere.  Yet,  in  many  fields  of  activity,  as 
business  has  increased  in  magnitude,  competition  of  the 
old  sort  has  proved  too  wasteful  and  has  become  obsolete. 
In  many  private  or  ordinary  industries,  as  well  as  in  the 
quasi-public  business  of  railroads,  we  have  entered  an  era 
of  combination  and,  comparatively  speaking,  of  non-com- 
petitive economic  life. 


184    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

If  the  government  had  been  more  far-seeing  and  alert 
at  an  earlier  period,  we  should  have  accomplished  these 
economic  transitions  with  less  political  and  social  distur- 
bance. If  railroad  discrimination  had  never  been  prac- 
tised, we  should  still  have  come  into  a  period  of  large 
industrial  combinations,  but  with  a  much  greater  diffusion 
of  ownership.  The  railroads  and  the  financial  institu- 
tions of  a  country  like  France  belong,  not  to  their  officers 
and  directors,  but  to  millions  of  small  investors. 

If  government  in  America  had  more  carefully  regulated 
the  conditions  of  economic  life,  in  order  to  maintain  equality 
of  opportunity,  it  would  have  been  scarcely  possible  for 
those  disturbances  to  have  arisen  which  are  due  partly  to 
the  over-development  of  particular  corporations,  and  partly 
to  the  undue  extent  of  the  personal  fortunes  and  corporate 
control  of  particular  individuals.  I  have  shown  in  earlier 
chapters  that  a  more  far-reaching  public  policy  would  have 
saved  us,  in  part,  from  the  political  difficulties  growing  out 
of  the  race  question,  and  from  the  economic  antagonisms 
that  brought  on  the  war  between  the  states.  I  have  tried 
to  prove  that  a  more  statesmanlike  policy  as  respects  the 
sources  of  natural  wealth  in  our  public  domain  would  have 
inured  to  the  benefit  of  the  national  treasury,  and  prevented 
some  of  those  harmful  inequalities  of  fortune  due  to  the 
acquirement  by  private  interests  of  the  iron  ore  deposits, 
the  petroleum  fields,  the  coal  belts,  the  timber  areas,  and 
certain  other  factors  of  national  enrichment,  which  only 
recently  were  the  property  of  all  the  people,  but  which, 
through  a  slack  and  negligent  public  policy,  have  now 
become  monopolized  in  the  hands  of  a  few,  and  are  the 
sources  of  colossal  private  fortunes.  In  like  manner,  it  is 
easy  enough  now  to  see  that  lines  of  public  policy  —  wholly 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  185 

equitable  and  in  accord  with  our  general  principles  of  free- 
dom and  equality  —  would  have  prevented  the  develop- 
ment of  the  larger  trusts  and  combinations,  at  least  in  the 
forms  they  have  now  assumed,  with  stupendous  individual 
fortunes  as  the  key  to  their  economic  methods. 

The  diversion  of  economic  resources  and  social  wealth, 
to  so  large  an  extent,  into  the  hands  of  a  comparatively 
small  number  of  people,  has  been  in  the  main  due  to  the 
failure  of  government  to  exercise  strictly  and  wisely  its 
functions  as  a  supervisor  and  regulator  of  conflicting 
economic  interests.  It  does  not  follow  that  these  neglects 
and  mistakes  have  resulted  in  conditions  in  any  manner 
fatal  to  our  future  welfare,  political  or  economic.  Certain 
counteracting  tendencies  must  be  encouraged,  and  the 
further  concentration  of  wealth  must  not  be  facilitated 
through  the  sheer  failure  of  government  to  protect  the 
ordinary  citizen  from  spoliation. 

It  still  remains,  as  I  have  repeatedly  said,  the  business 
of  government  in  America  to  build  up  a  homogeneous,  well- 
conditioned  citizenship.  Wealth  is  not  to  be  discouraged, 
but  on  the  contrary,  the  application  of  capital  to  the 
development  of  our  resources  and  the  further  creation  of 
wealth,  both  for  enlarging  the  average  means  of  living  and 
for  adding  to  the  sum  total  of  productive  capital,  must  in 
every  reasonable  way  be  fostered.  To  this  end  the  gov- 
ernment will  spread  enlightenment  as  to  the  best  ways  to 
increase  our  agricultural  output.  The  geological  survey 
will  render  its  invaluable  aid  to  mineral  development. 
Through  the  reclamation  service  and  all  the  other  policies 
that  relate  to  the  public  domain,  the  national  wealth  will 
be  further  promoted. 
There  will  remain  ample  opportunity  for  the  acquisition 


186    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

of  large  fortunes.  But  this  opportunity  must  not  be  at 
the  expense  of  the  man  who  would  otherwise  have  an  oppor- 
tunity to  acquire,  through  his  own  efforts,  a  moderate  for- 
tune. So  tremendous  and  tumultuous  are  the  present-day 
forces  of  the  economic  life,  that  both  now  and  for  years  to 
come  it  will  be  difficult  to  make  wise  application  of  those 
principles  of  regulation  and  control  that  belong  to  govern- 
ment. With  the  great  trusts  and  corporations  well  organ- 
ized to  secure  their  hearing  and  to  present  their  case  at 
the  political  tribunal,  we  have,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
federated  bodies  of  labor-unions,  with  large  power  intrusted 
to  central  officers,  equally  able  to  state  their  case  and  pre- 
sent their  demands  to  those  in  political  authority.  Gov- 
ernment must  ever  hold  the  man  as  more  important  than 
the  dollar.  Equal  suffrage  and  the  rule  of  the  majority, 
in  a  democratic  state,  put  the  balance  of  power  in  the 
hands  of  the  plain  people,  as  against  any  narrower  interests, 
whether  of  wealth  or  of  class. 

It  is  convenient  for  purposes  of  discussion  —  as  well  as 
for  the  judges  of  our  state  courts  in  times  of  need  —  to 
have  resort  to  old  principles  of  common  law.  Thus  we 
have  revived  the  almost  forgotten  rules  affecting  common 
carriers,  monopolies,  and  so-called  "conspiracies."  But  it 
is  necessary  to  have  in  mind  the  vast  change  in  real  con- 
ditions. Transportation  in  earlier  times  was  unimportant. 
Families  and  communities  being  well-nigh  self-sufficient  in 
their  economic  concerns,  the  common  carrier  had  only  a 
limited  function  to  perform.  Since  then,  the  industrial 
application  of  steam  power  has  revolutionized  all  the  con- 
ditions of  life.  It  has  brought  about  division  of  labor,  with 
concentration  of  industry  and  trade;  and  the  exchange  of 
commodities  throughout  extensive  areas  has  become  the 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  187 

most  essential  of  economic  processes.  Thus,  transportation 
emerges  as  a  separate  and  vital  industry,  upon  which  all 
other  industries  are  dependent,  and  its  public  character 
cannot  be  neglected. 

With  the  further  development  of  these  modern  conditions 
in  business,  there  came  of  necessity  the  vast  development 
of  capital  devoted  to  railroads,  and  to  the  kinds  of  industry 
dependent  upon  transportation.  Monopoly,  in  its  earlier 
forms,  was  due  to  some  special  advantage  or  arbitrary 
privilege.  But,  in  its  later  forms,  it  has  been  due  to  the 
natural  working  of  economic  laws.  As  I  have  attempted  to 
point  out,  in  the  period  of  rapid  development  the  larger 
shippers  secured  the  best  transportation  facilities,  and  thus 
grew  toward  monopolistic  proportions  with  undue  rapidity 
and  by  undesirable  means.  But  in  Germany  and  other 
countries  where  railroad  discrimination  has  not  existed,  the 
tendency  to  large  combination  in  standard  fields  of  in- 
dustrial production  has  been  almost  as  great  as  in  the 
United  States. 

This  change  in  economic  conditions,  due  to  modern  in- 
ventions and  the  increase  of  productive  capital,  has  given 
a  wholly  transformed  character  to  certain  political  and 
governmental  problems.  In  the  earlier  period  it  was  a 
small  and  incidental  part  of  the  work  of  our  state  govern- 
ments to  regulate  common  carriers;  it  was  to  be  classed 
with  such  functions  as  the  oversight  of  inns  and  pub- 
lic-houses. In  those  days,  the  protection  of  the  public 
against  extortion  by  monopoly,  or  against  conspiracies 
in  restraint  of  trade,  was  to  be  classed  with  such  matters 
as  the  regulation  of  usury  and  of  pawnbroking.  In  point 
of  fact,  the  protection  of  the  borrower  against  the 
exactions  of  the  money-lender,  and  such  reforms  as  the 


188    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

abolition  of  imprisonment  for  debt,  were  regarded  as  of 
vastly  more  importance  than  the  protection  of  the  public 
against  any  form  of  industrial  combination  or  monopoly. 

The  immediate  problem  of  government  is  to  permit 
natural  development,  while  lessening  incidental  evils.  The 
transitional  disturbances  and  restraints  due  to  such  devel- 
opment are  serious ;  and  to  meet  them  there  is  a  movement 
of  opinion  in  favor  of  harsh  and  arbitrary  restraints  to  be 
embodied  in  legislation.  But  the  temptation  to  make  such 
enactments  should  be  resisted.  Transportation,  for  ex- 
ample, is  a  great  industry  which  tends  toward  harmony. 
Competition  in  such  services  brings  about  the  very  dis- 
criminations that  the  opponents  of  railway  combination 
so  strongly  condemn.  The  telegraph  and  telephone,  local 
transit,  gas  and  electric  lighting,  are  instances  of  services 
that  are  monopolistic  in  their  nature,  while  public  in  their 
essential  character;  and  for  the  present  in  this  country 
they  are  not  to  be  regulated  by  the  forces  of  a  wasteful 
and  outgrown  competition,  nor  are  they  of  necessity  to  be 
taken  possession  of  and  operated  as  governmental  insti- 
tutions. 

Meanwhile,  there  is  no  standard  of  ideal  justice  by  which 
to  determine  precisely  how  far  government  is  to  go  in  regu- 
lating and  controlling  these  quasi-public  services.  At  the 
risk  of  repetition,  let  me  say  again  that  the  margin  of 
difference  within  which  government  must  act  is  compara- 
tively narrow,  as  a  rule.  Government  should  be  alert,  in- 
telligent, and  responsive;  but  with  a  highly  developed 
citizenship,  government  may  not  have  to  be  very  aggres- 
sive. In  the  exercise  of  its  latent  power  to  make  rates,  for 
example,  government  should  not,  as  a  rule,  anticipate.  It 
should  leave  quasi-public  corporations  to  adjust  their  own 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  189 

rates,  and  carry  on  business  in  their  own  way,  until  clearly 
defined  and  important  interests  make  definite  complaints; 
in  which  case  government  will  endeavor  to  act  as  final 
arbiter  in  a  spirit  of  justice. 

Where  industries  not  having  the  quasi-public  character 
of  railroads  are  concerned,  some,  in  the  nature  of  the  case, 
tend  to  vast  combination,  while  others  give  much  larger 
room  for  the  play  of  old-time  competition.  Science  is  con- 
stantly changing  the  character  of  industrial  processes;  and 
competition  appears,  disappears,  and  reappears,  in  fields 
where  combination  or  monopoly  had  been  thought  to  have 
gained  firm  control.  Government  must  do  its  utmost  to 
maintain  freedom  of  exchange,  freedom  of  opportunity,  and 
wide  publicity.  There  must  be  unremitting  effort  to  destroy 
every  phase  of  corrupt  relationship  between  great  business 
enterprises  and  the  forces  of  politics  and  government. 
But  government  can  only  moderate,  protect,  and  main- 
tain economic  order. 

President  Roosevelt  in  his  recent  messages  to  Congress 
has  made  it  clear  that  the  present  administration  does  not 
believe  that  government  can  successfully  check  the  normal 
development  of  combination  in  business;  and  it  has  been 
shown  by  the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission,  the  Attor- 
ney-General, and  the  Department  of  Commerce,  that  the 
present  laws,  as  the  courts  have  interpreted  them,  could 
not  be  strictly  and  fully  enforced  without  great  harm. 
There  are  certain  forms  of  agreement  in  the  field  of 
railroad  transportation  that  are  desirable,  and  that  the 
Interstate  Commerce  Commission  would  be  ready  to  sanc- 
tion, provided  they  were  given  full  publicity. 

As  regards  the  great  industrial  trusts  and  combina- 
tions, the  officials  charged  with  the  administration  of  the 


190    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Sherman  Anti-Trust  Law  make  a  sharp  distinction  be- 
tween combination  itself  and  certain  improper  methods 
and  practices  by  virtue  of  which  combination  may  inter- 
fere harmfully  with  the  reasonable  economic  freedom  of 
other  producers  in  the  same  field,  or  with  the  rights  and 
interests  of  the  consuming  public.  Thus  a  line  of  public 
policy  has  been  gradually  evolved,  under  the  present  gov- 
erning authorities  of  this  country,  which  looks  not  merely 
toward  the  wholesome  enforcement  of  law  to  break  up 
harmful  practices,  — whether  in  the  field  of  transporta- 
tion or  in  that  of  industrial  combination,  — but  which 
also  shows  how  the  law  may  be  safely  modified  for  the 
sake  of  a  desirable  freedom  of  activity  in  the  economic 
world. 

As  against  the  policy  which  stands  for  great  moderation 
in  the  making  of  laws,  but  high  vigilance  in  their  enforce- 
ment, is  the  policy  which  is  represented  by  many  sincere 
and  influential  leaders  of  political  thought  and  action. 
This  policy  would  transfer  to  the  government  the  colossal 
business  of  operating  the  railroads,  and  it  would  meet  the 
movement  for  combination  in  trade  and  industry  by  strin- 
gent artificial  checks.  An  example  of  such  check  is  to  be 
found  in  the  proposal  that  all  corporations  engaged  in 
interstate  commerce  should  be  compelled  to  secure  a  federal 
charter  or  license  under  the  specific  terms  of  which  they 
would  be  limited  to  a  certain  percentage  of  the  total  busi- 
ness of  the  country  in  their  particular  field. 

These  two  lines  of  opposing  policy  are  emerging  in  a 
clear,  distinct  way  from  the  fog  and  confusion  of  many  side 
issues.  Each  policy  has  its  difficulties  and  its  political 
problems.  Mr.  Roosevelt's  policy  requires  constant  effort 
to  overcome  the  systematic  political  pressure  of  corrupt 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS  191 

corporation  influences  in  political  life.  It  is  a  difficult 
task  to  keep  the  government  in  a  condition  so  strong 
and  so  free  from  undue  influence  that  it  can  maintain  its 
supremacy  and  regulate  the  mighty  forces  of  economic  life 
that  are  ever  contending  for  greater  mastery. 

Furthermore,  the  American  mind,  like  the  French  mind, 
and  unlike  the  English,  loves  to  see  clear  and  definite  solu- 
tions, and  is  tempted  to  follow  maxims  and  generalized 
statements.  But  the  Roosevelt  policy,  which  says  that 
railroads  are  at  once  public  institutions  of  vital  concern 
and  private  business  enterprises,  in  which  capital  must  be 
allowed  its  fair  chance  to  secure  profitable  results,  makes 
it  largely  a  matter  of  experiment  from  time  to  time  to 
discover  the  just  degree  and  method  of  public  control. 

Furthermore,  it  is  the  Roosevelt  doctrine  that,  outside 
of  quasi-public  corporations,  there  are  some  trusts  and 
combinations  that  are  good  and  some  that  are  bad,  and  that 
the  efforts  of  government  must  be  made  to  conform  to  the 
facts  and  conditions  of  the  expanding  economic  life  of  the 
nation.  But  this  is  a  statement  of  the  case  which  fails  to 
satisfy  the  mind  that  seeks  to  discover  conclusive  and  final 
remedies  for  economic  evils.  The  Roosevelt  view  is  one 
that  imposes  the  duty  of  moderation  and  care  upon  the 
lawmakers.  It  forces  unremitting  vigilance  and  effort 
upon  the  executive  departments,  as  well  as  high  character 
and  intelligence.  It  looks  to  an  increased  range  of  responsi- 
bility for  judges  and  juries.  From  the  political  standpoint, 
it  has  the  disadvantage  of  being  merely  a  policy  of  patience, 
conservatism,  and  high  public  efficiency,  at  a  moment 
when  the  atmosphere  of  politics  is  heavily  charged  with 
the  electric  forces  of  radicalism. 

The  opposing  policy,  represented  by  such  prominent 


192    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

leadership  as  that  of  Mr.  Bryan,  has  for  purposes  of  argu- 
ment some  of  the  advantages  that  go  with  clear  maxims 
and  the  promise  of  definite  solutions.  It  seems  a  clearer 
and  easier  statement  to  say  that  all  monopoly  and  combi- 
nation is  evil  and  must  be  destroyed,  than  to  analyze  and 
discriminate  and  qualify.  And  to  say  that  the  public 
interest  in  railroads  has  become  so  fundamental  that  the 
lines  must  be  operated  by  the  government  in  order  to 
keep  free  competition  alive  in  all  other  directions,  and  in 
order  to  preserve  our  democratic  institutions  from  control 
at  the  hands  of  corrupt  corporations,  is  a  position  that 
lends  itself  most  invitingly  to  the  purposes  of  political 
argument. 

It  is  to  be  expected  that  these  issues  must  be  faced  by 
the  people  of  the  country  at  the  polls  in  great  national  con- 
tests of  the  near  future.  They  are  likely  to  become  issues 
of  greater  consequence  and  magnitude  than  the  tariff  ques- 
tion, or  the  question  of  aiding  in  the  secure  and  orderly 
exchanges  of  business  by  means  of  a  good  system  of  money 
and  banking.  It  is  true  that  the  tariff  question  has  played 
a  great  part  in  our  political  controversies  of  the  past ;  and 
that  the  money  question  has  had  a  similar  place  in  our 
political  history,  — while  both  have  had  real  importance 
in  our  economic  progress  as  well  as  in  our  governmental 
and  political  life. 

But  while  the  adoption  of  one  policy  or  another  in 
respect  to  the  tariff  or  the  currency  may  considerably 
affect  the  conditions  under  which  private  business 
is  carried  on,  — just  as  a  regulation  of  common  carriers 
may  also  affect  the  conditions  of  private  business,  — it  is 
plain  that  tariff  and  currency  policies  may  be  changed  from 
time  to  time,  and  do  not  involve  deeply  the  nature  or 


CONTROL  OF  RAILWAYS  AND  TRUSTS 


193 


functions  of  government.  The  direct  operation  of  the 
railroads  of  the  United  States,  on  the  other  hand,  would 
mean,  in  practical  effect,  a  vast  extension  of  the  public 
service  in  a  new  and  unaccustomed  direction,  and  a  policy 
that  could  not  be  readily  changed,  like  an  outgrown  tariff 
or  an  imperfect  system  of  currency. 


VIII 


THE    TARIFF,    QUESTIONS     OF    TAXATION,    AND     PROBLEMS 
OF  MONEY  AND   CURRENCY   IN   OUR   POLITICS 

THE  part  that  the  tariff  question  has  played  in  our 
political  history  has  been  due  less  to  its  intrinsic  importance 
than  to  the  relation  it  has  borne  to  certain  other  contro- 
versies. Its  exaggerated  role  must  also  be  interpreted  in 
the  light  of  an  understanding  of  the  American  political 
mind,  with  its  doctrinaire  tendencies  and  its  argumentative 
habit.  There  has  not  been  a  village  or  a  cross-roads  ham- 
let in  the  United  States,  however  small,  which  has  not 
possessed  for  several  generations  its  free-traders  and  its 
protectionists,  accustomed  to  debate  this  subject  from 
boyhood  to  old  age  as  a  foremost  intellectual  diversion. 
Thus  the  tariff  question  has  outranked  even  the  money 
question  or  the  race  question  as  affording  subject-matter 
of  debate  and  controversy  in  that  universal  and  unending 
practice  of  popular  discussion  of  public  affairs  which  plays 
so  large  a  part  in  the  national  life  and  in  the  training  of 
American  citizenship. 

As  I  have  already  remarked  in  discussing  the  regulation 
of  railroads  and  of  monopolistic  industrial  tendencies,  the 
normal  play  of  government  in  such  matters  is  confined  to 
rather  narrow  limits.  Economic  forces  of  themselves  bring 
about  certain  balances  and  adjustments  that  need  only  a 

194 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  195 

moderate  amount  of  assistance  at  the  hands  of  the  state. 
Government  can  fix  certain  large  antecedent  conditions, 
can  be  dominated  by  certain  far-reaching  motives,  and  can 
afterward  —  by  experimental  changes  of  method  or 
policy  —  affect  somewhat  the  rapidity  of  economic  devel- 
opment. What  is  true  of  railroad  regulation  is  equally 
true  of  those  phases  of  the  tariff  question  which  have  been 
brought  into  political  controversy. 

The  starting-point  for  a  just  under  standing  of  American 
tariff  policy  is  to  be  found  in  the  conditions  and  purposes 
of  our  building  of  a  new  nation.  The  great  steps  in  the 
early  period  were,  not  the  placing  of  import  taxes  of  a 
more  or  less  discriminating  kind  upon  foreign  goods,  but, 
first,  the  nationalizing  of  commerce  by  the  establishment 
of  free  trade  among  all  the  states;  second,  the  acquisition  ) 
by  the  national  government  of  the  sole  power  to  levy  taxes 
upon  imports;  and  third,  the  prohibition  of  taxes  upon 
exports.  We  were  not  setting  out  to  show  the  world  an 
experiment  in  protectionism,  but  rather  to  show  how  we 
might  develop  a  continent  dedicated  to  the  practice  of 
free  trade.  Our  business  was  to  create  a  new  country,  in 
a  period  when  nationality  everywhere  was  a  matter  not 
merely  political,  but  also  of  commercial  and  industrial 
significance. 

Through  its  laws  and  policies  every  government  of  Europe 
had  made  an  economic  as  well  as  a  political  entity  of  its 
domains;  and  we  could  not  have  done  otherwise.  Mr. 
Hamilton,  in  his  famous  report  on  manufactures,  set  forth 
in  an  impressive  way  the  reasons  why  the  tariff  should  be 
so  arranged  as  to  give  incidental  encouragement  to  the 
growth  of  varied  industries  in  our  new  country.  We  were 
then  a  maritime  people,  nearly  all  of  our  population  living 


196    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

within  a  hundred  miles  of  the  Atlantic  seaboard.  Our 
shipping  and  our  foreign  commerce  were  our  largest  inter- 
ests. There  was  no  justification  at  that  time  for  a  tariff 
policy  that  would  sharply  have  checked  importation  and 
ocean  traffic.  It  was  enough  merely  to  aid  somewhat  a 
tendency  toward  the  beginnings  of  our  manufacturing 
growth. 

The  War  of  1812  so  seriously  interrupted  our  foreign 
trade  as  to  demonstrate  the  need  of  a  certain  degree  of 
independence  in  the  production  of  the  more  necessary  arti- 
cles of  industry,  especially  textiles;  and  hence  the  tariff 
of  1816,  which  was  broadly  protective,  with  duties  upon 
some  kinds  of  woven  goods,  for  example,  as  high  as  30 
per  cent  of  their  value.  By  successive  enactments,  the 
average  rates  of  protective  duties  were  increased  until 
1833,  when  a  compromise  tariff,  providing  for  gradual 
reductions,  was  adopted,  and  in  1842,  while  we  were  still 
on  the  protective  basis,  the  rates  were  comparatively 
low. 

In  1846  an  ad  valorem  revenue  tariff  was  adopted,  gen- 
erally referred  to  as  the  "Free  Trade  Tariff,"  although  a 
good  deal  of  incidental  protection  lurked  behind  its  rates. 
This  was  further  reduced  in  1857.  But  with  the  advent  of 
a  Republican  administration  and  the  outbreak  of  the  war, 
there  was  adopted  the  Morrill  tariff  of  1861,  largely  pro- 
tectionist in  its  theory,  while  designed  especially  to  pro- 
cure revenue  for  the  government  in  a  period  of  extreme 
fiscal  emergency. 

The  change  of  policy  during  the  twenty  or  twenty-five 
years  preceding  the  war  was  due  chiefly  to  the  sharp  diver- 
gence of  interests  between  the  North  and  South  produced 
by  the  expansion  of  cotton  growing  under  the  slavery 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  197 

system.  The  invention  of  the  cotton-gin  had,  for  the  time 
being,  revolutionized  agriculture  and  commerce  in  the 
South.  It  had  affected  the  world  as  profoundly  in  that 
period  as  the  tremendous  expansion  of  Northwestern  wheat 
and  corn  production  in  the  seventies  and  eighties  dis- 
turbed the  economic  conditions  of  the  world  a  genera- 
tion later.  It  was  to  the  clear  advantage  of  the  South, 
at  least  from  the  momentary  standpoint,  to  form  an  alli- 
ance with  the  manufacturing  interest  of  England  rather 
than  with  that  of  our  own  Northeast. 

It  was  just  at  this  time  that  the  British  manufacturers  — 
largely  those  of  the  textile  industries  and  especially  of  the 
cotton  spinning  and  weaving  districts  —  had  prevailed 
over  the  land-owning  interest  and  secured  the  repeal  of 
the  corn  laws.  They  were  obtaining  cotton  in  great 
quantities  in  consequence  of  the  development  of  our 
Southern  states;  and  with  the  opportunity  to  import  free 
food,  these  English  manufacturers  were  in  a  position  more 
than  ever  to  dominate  the  markets  of  the  world.  What- 
ever helped  the  development  of  the  Manchester  district  in 
England,  seemed  to  be  good  for  the  Southern  cotton  raiser ; 
and  it  was  obviously  against  the  interest  of  the  British 
textile  manufacturer  to  have  the  United  States  maintain 
its  earlier  protective  policy. 

But  for  extreme  sectional  antagonisms,  — due  far  more 
to  the  slavery  system  than  to  the  fact  that  Europe  was 
chief  customer  for  the  cotton  crop,  — the  tariff  question 
would  not  have  played  so  bitter  a  part  in  politics,  and  the 
tariff  laws  would  not  have  varied  so  much  with  the  rise 
and  fall  of  parties.  The  circumstances  which  had  enabled 
the  slave-holding  power  of  the  South  to  control  the  Demo- 
cratic party  of  the  country  for  other  purposes  during  the 


198    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

period  before  the  war,  enabled  it  also  to  control  that  party's 
action  upon  the  tariff. 

The  war  for  the  Union  was  waged  by  the  North  in  a 
spirit  of  intense  nationalism.  All  the  earlier  arguments  for 
varied  industries  and  national  economic  independence  were 
intensified  many  fold.  The  policies  that  promoted  the 
building  of  the  Pacific  railways  and  the  opening  up  of  the 
Western  lands  were  scarcely  separable  in  motive  from 
the  policy  which  maintained  high  protective  duties  for 
the  benefit  of  American  manufactures.  As  I  have  said  in 
previous  chapters,  the  period  that  followed  the  war  was  one 
of  stupendous  individual  and  social  energy.  It  witnessed 
a  great  spreading  out  of  the  American  stock  over  wide 
areas,  and  the  absorption  into  our  body  politic  of  millions 
of  strangers  from  Europe.  A  protective  tariff  at  such 
epochs  of  national  development  is  to  be  regarded  as  an 
effect  rather  than  a  cause.  It  was  an  arrangement  that 
blended  with  all  the  policies  and  all  the  tendencies  of  the 
time  for  bringing  about  swift  expansion  and  high  develop- 
ment in  a  new  country. 

Under  the  device  of  a  discriminating  tariff,  European 
capital  by  the  hundreds  of  millions  of  dollars  was  transferred 
to  this  country  to  engage  in  iron  and  steel,  textile,  and 
many  other  kinds  of  manufacturing,  and  to  help  build  and 
equip  the  railroads  that  were  distributing  the  products  of 
industry  as  well  as  those  of  agriculture.  The  tariff  policy 
had  a  direct,  as  well  as  an  indirect,  influence  upon  the 
diversifying  of  agriculture  itself. 

The  practical  difficulties  encountered  in  the  adjustment 
of  tariff  schedules  were,  indeed,  so  great  as  to  cast  a  serious 
doubt  over  the  wisdom  of  the  protective  policy.  It  is 
always  difficult  for  statesmanship  in  matters  so  technical 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  199 

and  complicated  to  supply  itself  with  the  requisite  infor- 
mation. And  a  great  variety  of  private  interests  are 
tempted  to  support  paid  lobbies  and  to  use  so-called  "  log- 
rolling "  methods  for  their  own  immediate  ends,  regardless 
of  the  general  bearings  of  the  policy  at  large. 

American  business  men  not  directly  affected  by  a  particu- 
lar schedule  have,  as  a  rule,  deplored  periods  of  tariff  agita- 
tion, because  of  the  uncertainties  involved.  They  wish  to 
make  their  plans  with  a  knowledge  of  the  larger  conditions 
affecting  industry  and  trade.  The  intensity  of  the  tariff 
issue  has  been  lessened  to  a  marked  degree  in  recent  years 

for  a  number  of  reasons.     One  reason  is  the  relative  matm> 

&* 

ing  of  the  newer  sections  of  the  country.  There  was  a 
period  when  the  almost  exclusively  agricultural  character 
of  the  Northwestern  states  —  coinciding  with  a  large 
European  demand  for  American  breadstuffs  and  provisions, 
created  a  strong  Western  sentiment  in  favor  of  free  trade. 
This  sentiment,  which  was  universal  among  Western 
Democrats,  was  also  strong  among  their  Republican  fellow- 
citizens  at  the  very  time  when,  as  in  the  Elaine-Cleveland 
campaign  of  1884,  the  tariff  question  was  the  most  con- 
spicuous issue  dividing  the  national  parties.  For  a  con- 
siderable period,  the  Republicans  of  Iowa  and  Minnesota 
were  in  the  anomalous  position  of  having  free-trade  planks 
in  their  state  platforms  in  years  of  presidential  and  con- 
gressional campaigning,  when  the  country  at  large  was 
fighting  out  the  battle  chiefly  upon  tariff  issues. 

But  this  period  passed  away  with  the  rapid  westward 
development  of  manufacturing,  the  immense  increase  in 
the  value  of  Western  lands,  and  a  perception  of  the  fact 
that,  for  a  long  time  to  come,  the  domestic  trade  of  the 
United  States  would  almost  wholly  absorb  the  energies  of 


200    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

our  producers  and  distributers.  Thus  the  Republican 
party  came  to  something  like  unanimity  upon  the  general 
principle  of  protection.  In  due  time,  the  Democratic  party, 
which  had  long  been  faithful  to  the  ideals  of  free  trade, 
began  for  some  reason,  at  first  scarcely  defined,  to  grow 
lukewarm.  And  it  was  evident  that  the  tariff  was  falling 
from  its  place  as  a  first-class  political  issue  to  a  place  in  the 
second  rank,  and  that  the  tendency  was  to  make  it  a  busi- 
ness man's  question  rather  than  a  vital  part  of  the  stock 
in  trade  of  the  professional  party  politician. 

The  chief  reason  for  this  change  is  to  be  found  in  the 
growth  of  Southern  manufactures.  When  the  South  shipped 
all  its  cotton  to  Europe  and  to  New  England,  it  was  for 
free  trade.  But  now  it  may  be  said,  on  a  rough  division, 
that  the  South  manufactures  one-third  of  its  own  raw 
cotton,  sends  one-third  North,  and  ships  the  other  third 
to  Europe.  Moreover,  the  proportion  kept  for  spinning 
and  weaving  in  the  South  grows  constantly  larger.  With 
its  great  deposits  of  coal  and  iron  ore,  and  its  abun- 
dant water-power  in  the  streams  falling  swiftly  from  the 
Appalachian  uplands,  the  South  is  changing  its  industrial 
character  just  as  Germany  in  recent  years  has  changed 
hers. 

In  short,  the  old  strain  of  the  tariff  question  in  our 
politics  was  largely  due  to  the  strictly  agricultural  character 
of  the  South  and  West.  It  is  not  many  years  since  the 
opposing  views  about  the  tariff  were  proclaimed  through- 
out the  land  by  bodies  of  propagandists  whose  fanaticism 
has  scarcely  been  equaled  in  all  our  annals  whether  political 
or  religious.  Our  political  life  and  its  problems,  as  I  have 
had  to  say  so  many  times  in  this  brief  survey,  can  never 
be  understood  apart  from  a  sympathetic  appreciation  of  the 


I 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  201 

temperament  of  the  American  people.  Ours  has  always 
been  a  population  capable  of  intense  conviction  on  the 
intellectual  side,  and  of  great  heights  of  enthusiasm  and 
devotion  on  the  moral  side. 

This  must  be  remembered  in  its  relation  to  the  anti- 
slavery  movement  of  the  North,  while  it  must  also  be 
borne  in  mind  as  belonging  only  in  lesser  degree  to  the 
pro-slavery  and  states'  rights  movement  in  the  South.  It 
explains  the  great  wave  of  agitation  for  the  prohibition  of 
the  liquor  traffic  that  swept  across  the  country.  It  mani- 
fested itself  even  in  the  agitation  of  a  question  of  mere 
business  expediency,  such  as  the  adoption  of  a  revised 
monetary  standard.  For  there  was  a  time,  not  so  long  ago, 
when  the  "friends  of  silver,"  as  they  called  themselves, 
seemed  possessed  by  a  sort  of  religious  frenzy ;  while  some 
of  the  opposing  advocates  of  a  single  metallic  standard 
really  worshiped  their  golden  calf  with  a  solemn  reverence 
that  indicated  a  satisfaction  of  soul  as  well  as  of  mind. 

This  capacity  for  absorption,  and  for  temporary  delusion, 
has  its  inconveniences;  but  it  goes  with  that  earnestness 
and  passion  for  right  solutions,  because  they  are  right,  that 
are  part  of  the  essential  life  and  vigor  of  our  democracy. 
In  due  time  the  delusions  pass  away;  the  exaggeration  of 
controversy  diminishes;  and  practical  common  sense  finds 
useful  working  solutions. 

It  has  been  part  of  the  constructive  mission  of  American 
politics  to  provide  favorable  conditions  for  the  develop- 
ment of  the  national  resources.  Every  great  nation  or 
empire  in  the  present  period  is  making  use  of  a  varied  but 
systematized  policy  for  the  economic  progress  of  its  own 
population  and  domain,  as  a  distinct  sphere  or  commercial 
entity.  Each  government  has  its  own  reasons  which  it 


202    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

must  justify  at  the  bar  of  national  opinion.  It  is  not  un- 
reasonable to  look  forward  to  a  time  when  the  nations  will, 
by  degrees,  come  to  see  the  desirability  of  according  some- 
thing like  the  same  freedom  to  the  currents  of  international 
trade  that  is  now  recognized  as  necessary  within  national 
boundaries.  But  the  doctrinaire  aspects  of  the  old  con- 
troversy between  protection  and  free  trade  have  almost 
entirely  passed  away. 

With  us  in  the  United  States  the  question  will  take  the 
form  of  a  series  of  practical  issues,  with  each  of  which 
statesmen  and  men  of  business  affairs  must  deal  as  best 
they  can.  Our  annexation  of  Porto  Rico  and  the  Hawaiian 
Islands  has,  at  length,  by  general  consent  justified  their 
inclusion  in  our  economic  zone.  Our  relations  to  Cuba 
have  been  followed  by  mutual  tariff  concessions,  which  are 
likely  to  be  increased  and  to  bring  Cuba  within  the  area  of 
our  domestic  commerce,  — although  for  her  own  revenue 
purposes,  Cuba  at  present  seems  to  require  a  moderate 
tariff  upon  imports  from  the  United  States.  The  tendency 
of  all  countries  having  colonial  possessions  is  to  hold  their 
outlying  territories  for  mutual  trade  benefits.  It  is  not  the 
desire  of  the  American  people  to  make  commercial  exploita- 
tion of  the  Philippines;  but  it  is  commonly  desired  to 
promote  Philippine  prosperity  by  giving  those  islands  a 
preferential  access  to  American  markets  for  their  sugar, 
tobacco,  and  other  chief  products. 

Our  best  and  most  constant  outside  customer  is  the 
Dominion  of  Canada.  At  an  earlier  period  in  our  history, 
we  traded  with  her  under  the  terms  of  a  mutually  bene- 
ficial reciprocity  treaty.  It  was  a  narrow  and  unwise 
course,  on  our  part,  to  discontinue  that  policy.  The  Demo- 
cratic party,  instead  of  working  for  ideal  and  universal  free 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  203 

trade,  would  have  been  wiser  to  have  advocated  approxi- 
mate free  trade  with  our  nearest  neighbors  as  a  beginning. 
But,  as  I  have  shown,  Democratic  idealism  on  the  tariff 
question  grew  out  of  the  earlier  conditions  of  the  cotton 
market,  and  simply  meant  free  trade  with  England,  when 
expressed  in  business  terms.  Canada  has  now  entered  upon 
a  period  of  constructive  economic  development  on  her  own 
behalf,  under  the  stimulus  of  high  protective  tariffs,  and  is 
far  less  inclined  than  formerly  toward  an  arrangement 
which  would  admit  American  manufactured  goods  at  re- 
duced rates  in  return  for  our  admission  of  Canadian  coal, 
fish,  lumber  and  forest  products,  and  various  farm  crops 
and  raw  materials. 

The  McKinley  tariff  of  1890  contemplated  a  great  exten- 
sion of  the  reciprocity  system,  especially  with  South 
America.  The  Wilson  tariff  (Democratic)  of  1894,  while 
still  a  high  protective  system,  made  an  average  reduction 
of  rates,  rejected  the  reciprocity  theory,  and  put  stress 
upon  the  theory  of  free  raw  materials.  The  Dingley 
(Republican)  tariff  of  1897  was  upon  the  plan  of  a  con- 
sistent and  complete  high  tariff  on  raw  materials  as  well 
as  finished  product.  The  decade  that  has  followed  the 
adoption  of  that  tariff  has  witnessed  great  changes  in  do- 
mestic and  foreign  business  conditions,  and  it  might  well 
be  assumed  that  the  schedules  then  adopted  would  apply 
very  imperfectly  to  the  present  situation. 

We  have,  indeed,  made  great  changes  in  the  other  parts  of 
the  national  revenue  system  which  was  developed  to  meet 
the  needs  of  increasing  expenditure  growing  out  of  the  war 
with  Spain.  But  the  business  of  the  country  has  somehow 
adapted  itself  to  the  Dingley  tariff  law,  and  even  yet  seems 
to  prefer  that  law  with  its  many  and  obvious  imperfections 


204    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

to  a  period  of  tariff  agitation  with  entire  uncertainty  as  to 
the  nature  or  extent  of  changes  to  be  adopted.  There  is 
no  indication  that  the  Sixtieth  Congress  will  seriously 
attempt  to  make  any  changes  in  the  present  tariff  system. 
It  is  a  somewhat  curious  and  significant  fact  that  Eastern 
Republicans,  with  Massachusetts  as  the  center  of  their 
expression,  and  Western  Republicans,  in  Iowa  especially, 
seem  to  be  more  urgent  in  their  demand  for  tariff  reform 
than  any  group  or  section  of  the  Democrats. 

In  1896  the  Democrats  themselves  diverted  the  national 
issue  from  the  tariff  to  the  money  question.  In  1900  they 
made  it  imperialism,  apropos  of  our  acquisition  of  the 
Philippines,  with  a  continuation  of  the  money  issue.  In 
1904,  with  the  radical  Democrats  writing  the  platform  and 
the  conservatives  naming  the  presidential  ticket,  all  other 
issues  of  the  campaign  fell  into  obscurity  before  the  one 
great  question  whether  or  not  the  country  would  sustain 
President  Roosevelt  and  keep  him  at  the  helm  for  another 
four  years.  The  result  was  the  greatest  personal  triumph 
in  the  history  of  American  politics.  Meanwhile,  business 
prosperity  has  continued  at  high  tide,  domestic  commerce 
has  constituted  95  per  cent  of  our  total  trade,  other  issues 
have  had  immediate  prominence,  and  the  tariff  question 
has  been  from  time  to  time  postponed. 

Quite  apart  from  the  far  greater  changes  of  tariff  policy 
that  must  come  in  the  future,  it  is  evident  that  an  expert 
commission  could  propose  many  changes  of  detail  in  the 
present  tariff  schedules  that  would  be  wise  and  beneficial 
if  made  on  due  notice  and  without  agitation.  The  plan  of 
a  double  tariff  consisting  of  maximum  and  minimum  rates 
has  been  adopted  by  several  leading  European  countries, 
with  a  view  to  securing  concessions  from  foreign  govern- 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  205 

ments.  Such  a  plan  is  now  advocated  by  many  Ameri- 
cans. 

It  is  probable  that  the  Republicans  in  the  campaign  of 
1908  will  promise  an  immediate  revision  of  the  tariff,  if 
continued  in  power.  Mr.  Bryan's  railroad  program  and 
his  proposed  solution  of  the  problem  of  the  trusts  and  com- 
binations, may  force  the  fighting  in  so  aggressive  a  way 
upon  those  issues  as  to  keep  the  tariff  in  the  background. 
Meanwhile,  economic  policies  essentially  protective  in  their 
spirit  and  purpose  are  characterizing  the  work  of  almost 
every  modern  government;  and  it  is  reasonable  to  believe 
that  future  changes  in  our  own  economic  policy  will  come 
by  way  of  modification  to  meet  altering  conditions,  and 
not  by  way  of  sharp  reversal.  The  Democrats  had  prom- 
ised a  radical  change  of  tariff  policy  when  they  won  their 
victory  after  the  enactment  of  the  McKinley  tariff  of  1890. 
But,  although  they  were  in  full  power  in  both  houses  of 
Congress,  —  with  President  Cleveland  straining  every  nerve 
to  promote  the  radical  tariff  reform  which  he  believed  to 
be  needful,  — it  was  found  that  the  established  business 
policy  of  the  country  could  not  be  revolutionized.  The 
resisting  forces  were  too  great  to  be  overcome. 

If  once  again  the  Democrats  should  come  into  full  power, 
perchance  in  the  election  of  1908,  it  is  not  likely  that  they 
would  even  attempt  a  reversal  of  the  protective  policy,  al- 
though they  would  undoubtedly  make  a  sweeping  revision 
of  the  present  Dingley  tariff.  In  their  attacks  upon  the 
trusts  and  monopolies,  it  has  been  a  favorite  contention  of 
Mr.  Bryan  and  many  other  Democratic  leaders  that  the 
tariff  has  greatly  fostered  industrial  monopoly.  It  is  evi- 
dent that  there  are  some  industries  which  had  taken  root 
and  grown  in  this  country  by  reason  of  tariff  protection, 


206    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

and  which  have  since  combined  to  suppress  domestic  com- 
petition and  maintain  artificial  prices  under  the  sheltering 
wall  of  the  tariff  which  keeps  out  the  foreign  competitor. 
How  numerous  such  instances  are  is  a  proper  subject  of 
inquiry ;  and  the  results  of  inquiry  might  point  to  desirable 
reductions  of  the  tariff. 

But  with  Europe  nationalistic  and  protective,  with  Japan 
growingly  active  in  policies  for  the  promotion  of  economic 
progress,  with  Canada  in  a  similar  mood  by  general  agree- 
ment of  statesmen  and  leaders  of  both  parties,  and  with 
the  three  chief  South  American  republics  entering  upon 
a  new  period  of  economic  development  under  government 
auspices,  it  is  not  likely  that  the  United  States  will  soon 
abandon  a  system  designed  to  promote  production  and 
trade  on  the  national  rather  than  the  international  basis. 

There  have  been  many  attempts  to  explain  the  disap- 
pearance of  what  before  the  war  was  our  vast  ocean  carry- 
ing trade.  Our  coastwise  trade  developed,  like  our  railroads, 
as  a  part  of  our  national  transportation  system,  foreigners 
being  excluded  from  it  by  law.  The  exigencies  of  the  Civil 
War  period  drove  us  temporarily  from  the  sea.  After  the 
war,  the  far  greater  rewards  that  American  capital  and 
labor  could  readily  obtain  in  the  internal  development  of 
the  country  afford  an  ample  explanation  of  our  failure  to 
return  at  once  to  our  abandoned  business  of  ocean  freight- 
ing. The  maritime  peoples  of  Europe,  with  fewer  oppor- 
tunities on  land,  were  driven  to  the  high  seas,  and  were 
prepared  to  carry  cotton  and  wheat  to  Europe  for  us  at 
prices  which  saved  us  money  on  every  bale  and  bushel,  thus 
enabling  us  to  devote  our  capital  and  energy  to  the  more 
profitable  tasks  of  growing  the  cotton  and  wheat,  and 
developing  our  varied  resources. 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  207 

Our  ability  to  hire  others  to  carry  on  our  ocean  freighting 
has  been  a  source  of  great  and  positive  gain  to  us  from  the 
business  standpoint.  Thus  far,  it  has  been  advantageous 
to  us  to  participate  in  the  triangular  movement  of  trade 
which  takes  our  surplus  cotton  and  food  to  Europe,  takes 
European  manufactures  to  South  America,  and  brings 
coffee,  sugar,  hides,  and  other  products  of  South  America 
and  the  West  Indies  to  this  country.  But  we  shall,  in  due 
time,  consume  most  of  our  own  food  supply,  and  shall 
steadily  increase  the  surplus  of  our  manufactured  goods. 
It  will  then  be  desirable  for  us  to  trade  directly  with  South 
America,  and  there  would  be  advantages  in  carrying  on 
such  trade  by  means  of  ships  of  American  register. 

The  completion  of  the  Panama  Canal  will  probably  mark 
the  beginning  of  a  new  era  in  our  foreign  commerce,  and 
it  may  possibly  be  found  desirable  to  promote  a  revival 
of  American  merchant  shipping  by  some  form  of  government 
aid.  Quite  apart  from  questions  of  business  profit,  there 
are  reasons  of  national  influence  and  dignity  that  might 
prompt  us  to  a  policy  of  mail  subventions  or  other  form 
of  encouragement  in  order  to  secure  frequent  sailings  under 
the  American  flag  to  both  coasts  of  South  America  and  to 
the  ports  of  the  Far  East. 

The  economic  policy  of  the  government  is  not  to  be 
understood  when  detached  from  a  study  of  the  people 
themselves  in  their  energy  and  business  character,  and  in 
further  relation  to  their  conditions  of  soil  and  climate, 
agricultural  opportunities,  mineral  resources,  natural  and 
artificial  lines  of  transportation,  and  other  conditions  of 
environment.  When  government  adopts  an  economic 
policy  that  is  in  keeping  with  natural  tendencies,  —  a 
policy  that  neither  creates  nor  thwarts,  but  that  stimulates 


208    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

and  assists,  —  it  would  seem  to  have  served  fully  its  normal 
functions. 

The  expense  of  government  is  very  great,  and  since  it 
absorbs  in  the  form  of  revenue  so  much  from  the  current 
wealth  produced  by  the  joint  effort  of  the  factors  in  eco- 
nomic life,  it  must  render  in  return  as  large  a  service  as 
may  be  possible.  When  government  collects  money  which 
it  expends  efficiently  in  the  carrying  on  of  schools,  it  is 
rendering  a  far-reaching  benefit  to  society  in  its  economic 
as  well  as  its  other  aspects.  What  it  expends  for  main- 
taining order  and  giving  security  to  life,  health,  and  prop- 
erty, is  amply  justified  if  means  are  well  adapted  to 
ends. 

The  cost  of  its  larger  defensive  forces,  —  its  army,  and 
its  navy,  — while  a  heavy  drain  upon  the  economic  re- 
sources of  modern  peoples,  can  only  be  condemned  as  facts 
and  conditions  may  affect  a  given  case.  If  preparation  for 
war  insures  peace,  an  economic  age  is  willing  to  pay  a  high 
price  for  such  insurance.  A  self-sustaining  service  like 
the  post-office  may  be  so  conducted  in  some  of  its  branches 
as  to  stimulate  very  greatly  the  exchanges  of  the  economic 
world,  and  to  promote  the  diffusion  of  intelligence.  A 
great  expenditure  for  the  improvement  of  rivers  and  har- 
bors may  be  more  profitable  to  commerce  than  burden- 
some in  its  tax  upon  resources.  A  vast  outlay  for  pensions, 
such  as  our  own  government  makes,  at  least  involves  no 
waste  of  social  wealth,  but  somewhat  equalizes  conditions 
by  returning  to  a  large  class  of  people  (who  are  more  or  less 
dependent)  what  it  took  from  the  sum  total  of  the  people's 
income. 

It  is  in  the  method  of  raising  the  money  to  supply  its 
needs,  almost  as  much  as  in  the  method  of  expending  the 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  209 

money,  that  governments  may  influence  economic  and  social 
conditions.  Thus  the  protective  tariff  after  all  is,  in  its 
origin,  an  incident  of  what  at  the  outset  was  the  only 
practicable  means  of  obtaining  a  national  revenue.  The 
great  public  income  derived  from  the  internal  tax  upon 
spirituous  liquors,  has  generally  been  levied  with  some 
intentional  reference  to  the  social  effect  of  placing  burdens 
upon  the  use  of  articles  which  are  regarded  either  as  harm- 
ful or  as  mere  indulgences.  The  resort  to  the  principle 
of  the  income  tax  is  advocated  either  with  a  view  to  giving 
the  government  an  additional  source  of  certain  and  direct 
income,  or  else  with  the  motive  of  securing  a  better  distri- 
bution of  the  burden  of  taxation.  A  similar  remark  would 
be  applicable  to  the  proposal  to  levy  taxes,  progressive  or 
otherwise,  upon  estates  in  process  of  transmission  from  their 
original  owners  to  their  heirs.  A  tobacco  tax  obviously 
bears  chiefly  upon  the  working  classes.  A  progressive 
income  tax  or  an  inheritance  tax  would  tend  in  its  measure 
to  lessen  the  inequalities  of  private  fortunes. 

As  I  have  said,  without  apology  for  constant  reiteration, 
the  underlying  purpose  of  the  American  government  has 
been  to  create  and  maintain  democratic  institutions,  based 
upon  a  high  degree  of  average  intelligence,  capacity,  and 
well-being.  And  it  is,  undoubtedly,  quite  as  permissible  an 
exercise  of  government  policy  to  levy  other  kinds  of  taxes 
in  such  a  way  as  to  aid  in  the  equalizing  process,  as  to  pro- 
vide tariff  discriminations  for  the  benefit  of  American  in- 
dustrial development.  Some  questions  of  this  kind,  if  just 
now  below  the  horizon  of  practical  politics,  are  likely  to 
come  into  view  in  the  near  future. 

I  have  more  than  once  referred  to  the  place  in  American 
political  life  that  has  been  occupied  by  questions  relating 


210    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

to  money  and  banking.  The  Constitution  conferred  upon 
Congress  the  power  to  coin  money  and  regulate  its  value. 
The  exigencies  of  the  Revolutionary  period  had  led  to  the 
issue  of  great  quantities  of  government  paper,  the  so-called 
"  Continental  notes,"  which  had  depreciated  in  value 
through  the  inability  of  the  Continental  government  to 
redeem  them.  Such  paper  issued  by  a  government  is 
nothing  else  than  a  forced  loan,  the  evidences  of  which  are 
in  small  denominations,  convenient  for  circulation  from 
hand  to  hand ;  and  it  serves  the  purpose  of  money.  Such 
promises  to  pay  will  be  accepted  with  greater  or  less 
discount,  according  to  the  prevailing  opinion  respecting 
the  prospect  of  their  future  redemption  at  par. 

It  is  obvious  that  a  widely  fluctuating  medium  of  ex- 
change —  based  ostensibly  upon  some  standard  of  value 
which  has  disappeared  from  actual  use  —  is  harmful  in 
the  extreme  to  the  ordinary  course  of  business,  and  almost 
prohibitive  of  intelligent  contracts  in  which  time  is  an  ele- 
ment. It  was  a  great  triumph  on  the  part  of  Mr.  Hamilton 
and  the  early  financiers  of  the  Republic  to  have  succeeded 
in  helping  the  business  community  to  reestablish  its  ex- 
changes upon  a  basis  of  gold  and  silver  coin. 

In  the  speculative  period  of  the  westward  movement 
and  the  economic  development  of  the  Mississippi  Valley 
after  1830,  the  actual  currency  of  the  country  was  chiefly 
supplied  by  issues  of  bank-notes  under  state  laws.  The 
earlier  political  controversies  growing  out  of  the  establish- 
ment of  a  national  bank  as  a  fiscal  agency  for  the  central 
government  — with  the  abolition  of  such  a  bank,  and  the 
establishment  of  the  treasury  and  sub-treasury  system  — 
were  related  more  closely  to  the  government  system  of 
collecting  and  disbursing  its  income  than  to  the  country's 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  211 

money  supply.  If  all  the  states  had  carefully  and  soundly 
regulated  the  note  issues  of  their  banks,  as  a  few  of  them 
did,  the  system  could  have  been  tolerated,  although  it 
would  not  have  been  a  wise  one.  But  in  many  states,  local 
bank  issues  were  without  proper  control  and  regulation, 
bank  failures  were  frequent,  and  the  business  of  the 
country  was  most  vexatiously  interfered  with  by  the  lack 
of  a  safe,  standard  currency. 

Yet  such  were  the  sectional  prejudices  and  antagonisms 
of  that  period  that  it  was  politically  impossible  to  give  the 
country  a  well-protected  and  uniform  system  of  currency. 
It  remained  for  the  outbreak  of  the  war  between  the  states 
to  force  a  nationalizing  of  the  currency  system.  The 
government  was  obliged  to  market  war  loans,  and  it 
desired  the  aid  of  local  bankers.  The  panic  of  1857  had 
brought  great  numbers  of  state  bank  failures,  and  had 
finally  discredited  what  came  to  be  called  the  "wild-cat" 
currency,  issued  under  state  authority. 

The  national  banking  law  of  1863  accomplished  several 
great  purposes  at  one  stroke.  It  rid  the  country  of  the 
state  bank-notes  by  levying  a  10  per  cent  tax  upon  them, 
thus  driving  that  form  of  currency  out  of  existence.  It  pro- 
vided for  the  incorporation  of  national  banks,  with  the 
power  to  issue  notes  guaranteed  by  the  national  govern- 
ment and  having,  therefore,  a  uniform  character  and  value 
throughout  the  country.  For  its  own  protection  it  required 
the  banks  desiring  to  issue  notes  to  purchase  United  States 
government  bonds  and  deposit  them  at  Washington,  the 
banks  being  allowed  to  issue  notes  approximately  equal  to 
the  face  value  of  the  bonds.  This  plan  helped  to  secure  a 
market  for  the  bonds.  Meanwhile,  the  banks  drew  the 
interest  upon  the  bonds,  and  the  government  levied  a 


212    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

moderate  tax  upon  their  note  issues  for  purposes  of  a  re- 
demption fund  in  case  of  the  failure  of  any  particular  bank. 
Great  numbers  of  the  state  banks  then  existing  took  out 
United  States  charters,  came  under  the  general  regulation 
of  the  national  banking  act,  and  became  parts  of  a  sys- 
tem which  has  continued  to  this  day  with  much  to  com- 
mend it. 

It  was  a  vast  relief  to  the  country  to  have  the  note- 
issuing  function  transferred  to  the  supervision  and  control 
of  the  national  government.  Unfortunately,  the  states- 
men of  the  Civil  War  period,  in  their  financial  exigency, 
did  not  see  how  to  keep  the  country's  business  upon  its 
established  standards  of  the  gold  and  silver  dollar.  Taxes 
were  increased  in  all  sorts  of  ways,  and  bonds  were  sold  as 
rapidly  as  possible;  but  the  demands  of  war  expenditure 
remained  unsatisfied  and  the  policy  of  issuing  non-interest- 
bearing  government  notes  for  purposes  of  circulation  - 
the  so-called  " paper  money"  or  " Greenbacks"  of  the  war 
period  — was  entered  upon  as  a  practical  method  of  ob- 
taining necessary  war  supplies. 

As  I  have  already  said,  the  value  for  practical  pur- 
poses of  such  government  notes  depends  upon  the  pre- 
vailing confidence  of  the  business  community  in  the  prac- 
tical ability  of  the  government  to  protect  and  redeem  its 
issues  at  their  face  value.  The  government  made  its  green- 
backs receivable  for  taxes  and  declared  them  a  legal  tender 
for  the  payment  of  ordinary  debts.  Naturally,  the  circula- 
tion of  government  paper  not  limited  in  quantity  and  with 
no  date  fixed  for  redemption,  put  a  premium  upon  gold 
and  silver  and  forced  them  out  of  circulation.  At  the  more 
dubious  period  of  the  Civil  War,  the  depreciation  of  paper 
money  was  very  serious.  The  price  of  gold  in  terms  of 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY          213 

paper  averaged  220  throughout  1864,  and  on  one  day 
reached  285. 

After  the  war  there  came  a  period  of  financial  readjust- 
ment and  a  tremendous  political  struggle  over  the  proper 
place  of  the  greenbacks  in  our  currency  system  both  in 
theory  and  in  practice.  The  Greenback  party  arose  as  a 
separate  movement,  while  both  of  the  older  parties  con- 
tained many  conspicuous  men  who  sympathized  with  the 
greenback  doctrines.  The  Greenbackers  believed  that  in- 
terest and  principal  of  the  national  debt  should  be  paid 
in  irredeemable  government  notes,  and  that  such  notes 
should  be  substituted  for  the  issues  of  the  national 
banks. 

It  was  held  that  the  government  bonds  had  been  sold 
at  great  discount  under  conditions  of  an  inflated  currency, 
and  that  to  pay  them  off  in  gold  would  be  an  injustice  to 
the  producers  and  workers  of  the  country,  and  a  discrimi- 
nation in  favor  of  the  people  then  popularly  known  as 
"bloated  bondholders."  The  conservative  elements,  on 
the  other  hand,  held  firmly  to  the  literal  contract  which 
made  the  bonds  redeemable  in  coin,  and  to  the  world- 
established  doctrines  regarding  the  nature  and  character 
of  money.  The  struggle  was  a  sincere  one  on  both  sides. 
The  West  and  South,  with  undeveloped  resources,  and 
representing  the  debtor  rather  than  the  creditor  class, 
naturally  feared  the  effect  of  what  might  be  in  the  nature 
of  contracting  the  currency  and  increasing  the  purchasing 
power  of  the  dollar. 

.In  the  Sherman  Resumption  Act  of  1875,  which  went  into 
effect  at  the  beginning  of  1879,  the  conservative  position 
prevailed,  and  it  will  be  the  verdict  of  history,  beyond  a 
doubt,  that  this  act  was  one  of  sound  policy  and  broad 


214    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

statesmanship.  The  government  notes  remained  in  circu- 
lation, but  their  quantity  was  fixed;  and  the  mere  fact 
that  the  government  could  and  would  redeem  them  upon  de- 
mand gave  them  the  same  position  for  ordinary  use  as  the 
bank-notes,  so  that  all  parts  of  the  sum  total  of  our  circu- 
lation, whether  gold  and  silver  coin,  bank-notes,  or  green- 
backs, circulated  interchangeably  and  without  prejudice. 

But  with  the  acceptance  by  the  country  of  the  metallic 
basis  of  its  money  system,  there  arose  another  controversy 
which,  in  the  end,  assumed  deeper  intensity  and  larger 
political  proportions  than  had  ever  belonged  to  the  paper 
money  struggle.  Before  the  war,  both  gold  and  silver  had 
been  monetary  standards.  The  law  had  fixed  the  ratio 
of  weight  between  them  at  16  to  1.  Before  the  great  dis- 
coveries of  gold  in  California  and  Australia,  silver  had  been 
relatively  more  plentiful,  and  since  the  ratio  did  not  fit 
exact  bullion  conditions,  the  real  monetary  basis  was  the 
silver  dollar.  After  the  sudden  expansion  of  gold  output, 
however,  the  bullion  situation  had  changed,  and  at  the 
existing  mint  ratio  the  gold  dollar  was  a  little  cheaper, 
and  it,  in  turn,  became  the  actual  standard. 

In  1873  Congress,  without  much  consideration  of  the 
question,  had  passed  a  law  practically  abolishing  silver  as 
an  alternative  standard.  The  bullion  ratio  in  the  open  mar- 
ket was  such,  at  that  time,  as  to  give  the  question  a  seem- 
ingly slight  importance.  But  after  the  full  resumption  of 
specie  payments,  — with  the  practical  policy  fairly  en- 
tered upon  of  paying  the  interest  and  principal  of  the 
public  debt  in  gold,  —  bullion  conditions  rapidly  changed. 
Not  only  were  great  deposits  of  silver  found,  but  new 
methods  and  processes  for  the  extraction  of  silver  enor- 
mously increased  and  cheapened  the  supply. 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY          215 

The  mints  had,  in  former  periods,  been  open  to  all  comers 
who  had  silver  bullion  to  exchange  for  silver  dollars  of  a 
legal  weight  and  fineness.  All  that  was  required  was  the 
payment  of  a  small  seigniorage  for  the  expense  of  assaying 
and  coining.  Such  dollars  had  been  money  of  absolute 
authority  for  the  payment  of  all  public  and  private  obliga- 
tions. But  with  a  large  output  of  new  silver,  the  mints 
were  found  closed,  the  perfunctory  enactment  of  1873  was 
popularly  discovered,  and  a  vast  contention  began  in  which 
sincere  public  conviction  as  well  as  powerful  private  inter- 
est was  enlisted  upon  each  side. 

It  was  a  contest  that  was  waged  through  twenty  years 
with  ever  growing  intensity.  Various  conditions  were  coin- 
ciding after  the  panic  of  1873,  in  a  long  period  of  depression, 
to  influence  the  motives  and  the  point  of  view  of  men  in 
the  farming  regions.  The  railroad  building  and  the  land 
speculation  following  the  war  had  been  overdone.  Hard 
times  had  set  in  after  one  of  the  sharpest  financial  panics 
in  our  history.  Almost  the  entire  country  west  of  Penn- 
sylvania had  been  carried  away  by  enticing  monetary 
doctrines,  and  Congress  had  voted  in  1874  to  inflate  the 
greenback  issues  to  a  fixed  amount  of  $400,000,000.  The 
country  had  been  saved  from  this  mistake  only  by  the  veto 
of  President  Grant,  who  adhered  to  a  financial  policy  that 
had  been  initiated  by  a  great  authority  at  the  head  of  the 
Treasury  Department,  Mr.  McCulloch. 

In  1866,  just  after  the  war,  Congress  had  approved  the 
Secretary's  policy  of  a  steady  retirement  of  greenback  notes 
and  contraction  of  the  currency.  The  fresh  confidence 
thus  given  to  the  credit  of  the  government  would  in  any 
case  have  increased  the  purchasing  power  of  the  green- 
backs, and  this  would  have  expressed  itself  in  a  general  fall 


216    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

of  prices.  But  a  fall  of  prices  always  seems  a  hardship  to 
farmers  and  producers;  and  there  was  a  demand  for  a 
check  in  the  policy  of  contraction.  In  1868  Congress 
stopped  the  Treasury  practice  by  fixing  the  volume  of  notes 
at  $356,000,000,  that  being  the  amount  then  in  circula- 
tion. 

After  the  panic,  as  I  have  said,  and  in  the  period  of  reac- 
tion, the  demand  for  inflated  paper  issues,  for  the  sake  of 
increasing  prices  and  making  it  easier  to  pay  debts,  swept 
the  Mississippi  Valley  with  irresistible  strength,  and  it  was 
reflected  in  the  measure  of  1874,  vetoed  by  the  President. 
When  Greenbackism,  after  that,  attempted  to  carry  its 
views  as  a  separate  party  organization,  it  was  weaker  than 
when  it  had  pervaded  both  institutional  parties  as  a  social 
and  economic  doctrine.  It  is  highly  creditable  to  the 
country  that  in  the  face  of  such  a  sentiment,  under  the  pall 
of  deep  business  depression,  the  Resumption  Act  of  1875 
was  carried  through  Congress. 

This  act  made  very  slight  contraction  of  the  currency, 
fixing  the  volume  of  greenbacks  at  $346,000,000;  but  it 
provided  that  they  should  be  kept  at  par  with  gold  by  being 
made  redeemable,  —  although  they  were  not  to  be  canceled 
when  redeemed,  but  paid  out  again  by  the  government  as 
a  part  of  the  country's  volume  of  currency. 

The  redemption  feature  was  not,  however,  to  go  into 
effect  until  1879.  Meanwhile,  the  silver  movement  had 
its  origin  chiefly  at  the  instance  of  the  Western  mine  owners. 
In  1876  the  price  of  silver  had  so  declined  that  the  bullion 
value  of  the  silver  dollar  of  412.8  grains  was  about  89^ 
cents  in  terms  of  gold.  The  discount  on  greenbacks  at 
that  time  had  made  them  worth  about  87J  cents.  Notes 
were  growing  better  because  of  the  improving  credit  of  the 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  217 

government;  but  silver  was  growing  worse  because  of 
certain  world-wide  conditions  affecting  its  production  and 
use. 

In  1876  the  House  Committee  on  Mines  and  Mining  at- 
tempted to  secure  the  passage  of  a  bill  which  would  have 
opened  the  mints  to  the  coinage  of  silver  dollars  for  the  full 
benefit  of  any  one  depositing  the  bullion,  such  dollars  to 
be  full  legal  tender  for  all  public  and  private  purposes. 
The  bill  was  not  passed,  but  a  great  debate  was  entered 
upon.  It  resulted  in  the  compromise  known  as  the  Bland- 
Allison  Act  of  1878.  This  is  to  be  remembered  as  one  of 
the  landmarks  in  our  economic  history.  The  silver  dollar, 
let  it  be  borne  in  mind,  had  wholly  disappeared  ten  years 
before  the  war;  so  that  when  men  spoke  of  hard  money 
and  payment  in  coin,  they  meant  gold.  Legally,  however, 
the  silver  dollar  had  existed  until  it  had  been  dropped  from 
the  list  of  American  coins  by  the  Act  of  1873.  If  we  had 
merely  repealed  the  Act  of  1873,  having  resumed  specie 
payment  in  1875,  we  should  have  found  ourselves  in  effect, 
like  Mexico,  upon  a  silver  basis. 

In  other  words,  at  the  weight  ratio  of  16  to  1,  the  silver 
dollar  in  the  later  seventies  was  ten  cents  cheaper  than  the 
gold  dollar,  and  would  have  been  used  for  the  payment  of 
debts,  so  that  gold  would  have  disappeared  from  circulation. 
It  was  the  belief  of  the  silver  mining  men  and  of  the  theoreti- 
cal bimetallists  that  the  free  opening  of  the  mints  to  silver 
would  so  affect  the  market  price  for  both  precious  metals 
as  to  restore  approximately  the  bullion  ratio  of  16  to  1. 
France  and  her  fellow-members  of  the  so-called  Latin 
Monetary  Union  had,  meanwhile,  suspended  the  coinage 
of  silver.  Our  country,  for  years,  was  engaged  in  ne- 
gotiations with  European  governments  on  the  basis  of  the 


218    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

theory  that  silver  and  gold  could  be  kept  at  a  parity  by 
an  international  agreement,  fixing  the  ratio  and  providing 
for  the  opening  of  mints  and  the  giving  of  full  validity 
to  both  metals  for  monetary  purposes. 

But,  meanwhile,  our  compromise  measure  of  1878  made 
the  government  a  purchaser  of  not  less  than  $2,000,000 
worth  of  silver  every  month,  to  be  coined  into  dollars  and 
put  into  circulation.  This  was  really  token  money,  because 
the  government  coined  on  its  own  account,  issued  the  silver 
dollars  — or  notes  representing  them  — at  par  with  gold, 
and  maintained  free  interchange  on  the  gold  basis  of  all 
parts  of  our  monetary  system.  But  government  purchase 
did  not  restore  old-time  ratios.  The  price  of  silver  kept  a 
downward  course;  Europe  would  not  join  in  a  bimetallic 
movement;  the  market  ratio  between  gold  and  silver  fell 
to  25  to  1,  and  later,  for  a  time,  to  about  32  to  1.  In  other 
words,  the  actual  amount  of  silver  in  a  standard  dollar 
came  to  be  worth  for  a  time  only  fifty  cents. 

After  a  period  of  years,  the  government's  monthly  pur- 
chases of  silver  increased  under  modifications  of  the  law  to 
4,500,000  ounces  per  month,  the  government  issuing  silver 
certificates  and  depositing  the  bullion  without  attempting 
to  coin  it.  The  psychological  effect  upon  the  people  in 
the  West  and  South  where  silver  dollars  circulated  freely 
was  one  that,  under  the  given  conditions,  could  hardly  have 
been  different.  They  became  accustomed  to  actual  con- 
tact with  the  silver  dollar,  and  it  seemed  to  them  a  sufficient 
monetary  standard.  They  had  crops  to  sell  and  interest 
to  pay  on  mortgages.  Cheap  money  and  high  prices  seemed 
to  them  eminently  desirable.  They  familiarized  themselves 
with  the  idea  that  the  Act  of  1873  was  a  crime,  and  that  the 
gold  standard  was  a  device  of  the  Eastern  and  European 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  219 


capitalists  and  money-lenders  for  the  oppression  of  the 
producing  and  debtor  classes. 

Meanwhile,  the  volume  of  outstanding  silver  dollars  and 
silver  notes  based  upon  bullion  purchases  became  enormous. 
And  the  Treasury  was  finding  a  growing  difficulty  in  hold- 
ing enough  gold  reserve  to  preserve  the  faith  of  the  country 
in  its  ability  to  keep  the  different  parts  of  our  money  system 
interchangeable  on  the  basis  of  the  intrinsic  value  of  the 
gold  dollar.  The  laws  were  in  such  condition  that  the 
silver  notes  could  be  pushed  into  circulation  by  bankers 
and  others,  who  hoarded  greenbacks,  and  could  use  them 
(the  volume  of  greenbacks  being  kept  at  $346,000,000)  by 
a  so-called  "endless  chain"  plan  to  draw  the  government's 
gold  reserve  out  of  the  Treasury.  There  seemed"  to  be 
actual  danger  lest,  in  spite  of  ourselves,  we  should  be 
thrown  upon  the  silver  basis. 

Mr.  Cleveland,  in  his  second  term,  found  himself  con- 
fronted with  this  imminent  danger.  Every  possible  Treas- 
ury device  was  resorted  to  by  the  administration  to  keep  a 
reserve  stock  of  gold  and  maintain  full  monetary  credit. 
Government  bonds  were  issued  not  so  much  to  meet  exigen- 
cies due  to  public  expenditure  as  to  obtain  fresh  stocks  of 
gold.  At  length,  a  special  session  of  Congress  was  impelled 
in  1893  to  suspend  the  monthly  purchases  of  silver  bullion. 

This  purchase  device  had  been  unsatisfactory  to  both 
sides  in  the  great  contention.  It  afforded  a  large  market 
to  silver  miners ;  but  what  they  wanted  was  the  full  resto- 
ration of  silver  as  standard  money,  and  the  farmers  of  the 
South  and  West,  from  1893  to  1896,  were  stirred  up  by 
an  organized  propaganda  which  was  carried  into  every 
school  district.  Public  men  of  both  great  parties  were 
divided.  The  issue  culminated  in  the  election  of  1896. 


220    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

The  silver  men  carried  the  Democratic  national  convention 
and  made  Mr.  Bryan  their  standard-bearer.  The  Repub- 
licans were  forced  by  the  logic  of  the  situation  to  what,  for 
practical  purposes,  was  a  support  of  the  gold  standard, 
although  they  still  held  out  some  hope  of  a  possible  inter- 
national arrangement.  Mr.  McKinley,  the  Republican 
nominee,  had  been  friendly  to  the  use  of  silver  money  and 
had  hoped  for  the  ultimate  success  of  the  bimetallic  system. 

From  having  been  a  less  emotional  and  popular  contro- 
versy in  the  earlier  period,  the  silver  question  had,  after 
1890,  aroused  intense  feeling  and  conviction.  In  states  like 
Colorado  it  swept  the  whole  community  before  it,  so  that  in 
its  sectional  aspects  it  was  more  sharply  defined,  if  possible, 
than  the  slavery  contest  had  been  in  the  fifties.  In  so  far 
as  it  was  due  to  selfish  motives,  it  was  a  movement  of  the 
silver  mining  interests  that  were  successful  in  stirring  up  the 
agricultural  regions  at  a  time  when  farms  were  mortgaged, 
prices  were  low,  drought  had  devastated  extensive  regions, 
foreclosures  and  evictions  were  common,  and  the  gold 
standard  seemed  in  some  subtle,  unceasing  way  to  be 
making  it  harder  and  harder  for  the  farmer  to  obtain 
dollars  with  which  to  meet  deferred  payments. 

After  the  so-called  sound  money  victory  of  1896,  it  was 
inevitable  that  the  question  should  have  recurred  in  1900. 
But  many  things  had  happened  to  lessen  its  intensity.  A 
great  wave  of  prosperity  had  set  in,  and  the  war  with  Spain 
had  given  rise  to  new  questions.  With  amazing  rapidity, 
the  world's  production  of  gold  had  increased,  and  even  the 
mining  interests  of  the  West  showed  quick  recovery  from 
the  shock  of  defeat.  Colorado  consoled  herself  for  a  declin- 
ing silver  interest  by  a  remarkable  revival  and  expansion 
of  her  gold  output. 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  221 

The  great  money  fight,  like  many  another  contest  among 
earnest  bodies  of  men,  seems  not  discreditable  to  either 
side  in  the  contest  if  studied  fairly,  even  when,  as  in  this 
case,  the  perspectives  of  history  are  still  very  short  ones. 
One  must  study  the  statistics  of  farm  values,  the  facts  of 
railroad  building,  and  all  other  phases  of  that  unprecedented 
movement  which  has  built  up  our  Western  states  before  he 
can  pronounce  judgment  upon  the  motives  and  convictions 
that  entered  into  our  monetary  contest. 

Where  contracts  for  the  payment  of  money  at  deferred 
periods  are  sharply  sectionalized,  it  is  extremely  difficult 
to  make  it  appear  to  the  opposing  private  interests  that 
the  money  terms  written  in  such  contracts  have  the  same 
intrinsic  character  at  the  end  of  the  period  that  they  had 
at  the  beginning.  We  have  now  been  fortunate  in  having 
a  long  series  of  years  of  remarkable  prosperity,  during  which 
the  farms  of  the  West  have  paid  off  their  mortgages,  and 
in  which  capital  has  become  widely  diffused.  Conditions 
now  existing  make  it  easy  for  the  government  to  main- 
tain the  parity  on  a  gold  basis  of  all  parts  of  the  monetary 
system.  The  great  leaders  of  the  battle  against  a  gold 
standard,  while  professing  to  retain  their  theoretical  views, 
admit  that  the  enormous  recent  production  of  gold  —  to- 
gether with  the  total  change  in  the  sectional  relation- 
ships of  debtor  and  creditor  classes  —  have  removed  the 
money  issue  from  the  realm  of  immediate  practical  politics. 

Yet  the  monetary  system  of  the  country  is  one  that  could 
be  improved  and  strengthened  in  many  respects,  and  there 
are  questions  of  currency  reform  that  ought  to  be  dealt 
with  in  a  scientific  spirit  at  a  moment  when  they  are  not 
involved  in  partisan  or  popular  controversy,  and  have 
little  if  any  sectional  bearing.  It  is  no  part  of  my  purpose 


222    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

to  discuss  currency  reform  in  a  technical  sense.  I  am 
merely  showing  how  the  money  question  has  entered  into 
political  controversy  in  this  country,  and  how  it  has  inevi- 
tably been  associated  with  all  the  conditions  of  rapid  na- 
tional expansion.  It  is  the  present  judgment  of  the  great 
business  forces  of  the  world  that  gold  answers  better  than 
anything  else  for  the  purposes  of  a  standard  upon  which  to 
base  public  and  private  contracts  for  the  repayment  of 
borrowed  capital,  and  as  a  commodity  in  which  to  redeem 
all  forms  of  circulating  currency.  No  single  commodity, 
such  as  gold,  could  form  a  theoretically  perfect  standard. 

Thus  far,  however,  the  money  function  of  government 
throughout  the  civilized  world  has  been  confined  in  the 
main  to  a  recognition  of  the  determinations  of  the  com- 
mercial world,  and  to  the  protection  of  the  standard  modes 
by  which  the  business  community  agrees  to  carry  on  its 
transactions.  It  is  one  of  the  chief  functions  of  modern 
government  to  recognize,  record,  and  enforce  private  con- 
tracts. Government  aids  the  business  world  by  legalizing 
and  inspecting  weights  and  measures.  Money,  as  the  meas- 
ure of  value,  is  of  such  vital  importance  to  the  business 
world,  that  government  from  the  earliest  times  has  coined  it 
and  protected  it.  It  has  been  our  fate  more  than  that  of 
most  other  countries  to  have  brought  the  problems  of 
money  into  sharp,  intense  political  controversy.  It  is  now 
plainly  the  duty  of  government  so  to  adjust  the  monetary 
system  as  to  diminish,  so  far  as  possible,  the  range  of  future 
political  controversy  in  that  particular  field. 

As  I  have  shown  with  regard  to  other  questions,  the 
economic  world  goes  very  far  toward  the  establishment  of 
its  own  laws  and  principles.  The  function  of  government 
is  to  keep  those  laws  and  principles  in  operation  for  the 


PROBLEMS  OF  TARIFF  AND  OF  MONEY  223 

general  benefit ;  to  protect  sections  and  individuals  against 
injustice,  and  to  maintain  conditions  of  safety  and  harmony. 

The  business  of  banking,  quite  apart  from  the  issue  of 
currency,  is  one  that  government  very  properly  regulates 
for  the  protection  of  the  community  at  large.  For  similar 
reasons  the  business  of  insurance  is  one  that  requires,  in  a 
peculiar  sense,  the  oversight  and  regulation  of  government. 
It  is  easily  conceivable  that  both  banking  and  insurance 
are  functions  that  might  with  comparative  ease  be  trans- 
ferred to  government  for  direct  management.  In  certain 
countries,  as  in  Germany,  there  is  a  marked  tendency 
toward  the  assumption  by  government  of  various  forms  of 
banking  and  insurance  as  a  means  chiefly  of  promoting  the 
social  and  economic  well-being  of  the  poorer  classes.  It  is 
not  unlikely  that  government  savings  banks  and  forms  of 
working-men's  insurance  may,  in  the  near  future,  come  to  be 
strongly  urged  in  all  civilized  countries  as  enterprises  that 
government  ought  to  undertake. 

With  us  in  the  United  States,  the  chief  thing  is  to  en- 
courage men  in  the  exercise  of  their  own  energies  through 
protection  of  their  opportunities.  The  state  will  not  com- 
pel the  working-man  to  save  his  money,  but  it  can  and 
should  encourage  him  in  saving  it  by  so  regulating  and  con- 
trolling savings  banks,  industrial  and  life  insurance,  and 
other  financial  and  business  organizations,  as  to  safeguard 
the  working-man's  opportunities  and  to  encourage  him  in 
thrift.  Thus  far  in  our  experience  of  nation-making  and 
government,  political  controversy  over  questions  of  an 
economic  nature  has  merely  brought  us  to  the  point  of  a 
better  regulation  of  economic  methods  and  conditions  for 
the  protection  of  the  ordinary  citizen  in  the  exercise  of  a 
reasonable  freedom  of  action. 


IX 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY,  INTERNATIONAL  RELATION- 
SHIP, AND  EXTENSION  OF  SOVEREIGNTY 

HOWEVER  sound  may  be  the  theory  that  a  nation  should 
never  carry  its  political  differences  into  questions  affecting 
its  outside  relations,  it  is  manifestly  impossible  to  give 
practical  effect  to  any  such  counsel  of  prudence.  Even 
those  who  profess  to  stand  by  the  old  maxim  that  they  are 
for  their  own  country,  right  or  wrong,  usually  insist  upon 
their  own  point  of  view  in  a  time  of  emergency.  It  is  a 
difficult  matter  for  a  nation  to  find  a  consistent  line  of  policy 
in  its  relationships  with  the  rest  of  the  world,  and  to  keep 
domestic  controversies  from  affecting  foreign  relations. 

We  became  a  nation  at  a  time  when  international  law, 
in  so  far  as  it  had  been  evolved,  was  merely  a  body  of  doc- 
trine and  usage  that  concerned  the  Christian  powers  of 
Europe.  Wars  were  frequent  and  devastating,  alliances 
were  shifting,  reigning  dynasties  were  frequently  in  closer 
understanding  and  harmony  with  one  another  than  with 
the  nations  over  which  they  ruled,  and  portents  of  great 
transition  seemed  everywhere  visible. 

The  English  retained  the  provinces  and  vast  territory  to 
the  north  of  us,  the  French  and  Spaniards  held  the  terri- 
tory to  the  west  and  south,  including  Florida  and  the 
mouths  of  the  Mississippi  River.  France  had  helped  us 
in  our  war,  but  the  events  of  the  French  Revolution  had 

•JIM 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     225 

aroused  much  prejudice  among  sober-minded  and  con- 
servative Americans,  while  the  philosophical  principles  of 
French  political  reform  continued  to  fascinate  the  followers 
of  Mr.  Jefferson.  The  French  had  expected  us  to  adhere 
to  an  alliance  with  them  which  might  be  useful  in  their 
times  of  need. 

Our  foreign  relations  in  that  early  period  played  a  large 
part  in  our  internal  controversies,  and  Washington's  steady 
judgment  was  of  incalculable  value.  His  Farewell  Address, 
counseling  the  nation  against  foreign  alliances,  has  held 
its  place  as  an  authoritative  document.  If  his  views  had 
prevailed  in  practical  application,  it  is  probable  that  we 
should  have  avoided  the  second  war  with  England,  the  issues 
of  which  might  just  as  well  have  been  settled  by  a  patient 
and  skilful  diplomacy.  But  that  war,  like  the  war  with 
Mexico  in  1846,  and  the  war  between  the  states  in  1861, 
was  largely  due  to  the  fact  that  we  had  failed  as  yet  to 
secure  a  sufficient  harmony  in  our  domestic  politics,  so 
that  the  pendulum  of  controversy  swung  too  far  and  too 
violently. 

If  our  experience  has  taught  us  anything,  it  is  that  one 
of  the  best  safeguards  against  foreign  war  is  domestic 
peace;  while,  on  the  contrary,  the  harsh  and  unregulated 
play  of  political  contention  within  a  nation,  due  to  funda- 
mental discords,  is  a  great  hindrance  to  the  diplomatist 
who  would  like  to  find  peaceful  solutions  for  differences 
between  nations. 

After  the  statesmanship  and  doctrine  of  the  Washington 
period,  and  the  mishap  of  our  second  war  with  England,  the 
next  great  experience  in  our  development  of  foreign  policy 
and  doctrine  came  with  the  announcement  in  1823  of 
what  is  called  the  Monroe  Doctrine.  Our  example  had 
Q 


226    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

been  followed  by  the  Spanish  territories  of  Mexico,  Central 
America,  and  South  America,  and  a  series  of  Spanish- 
American  republics  had  been  established  with  constitu- 
tions modeled  upon  ours.  A  reaction  had  set  in  among 
the  ruling  coteries  of  Europe,  and  the  Holy  Alliance  had 
been  formed  to  stop  the  disintegrating  trend  of  liber- 
alism and,  incidentally,  to  aid  Spain  in  the  reconquest  of 
America. 

The  aims  of  the  Holy  Alliance  were  contrary  to  English 
policy,  and  our  government  was  encouraged  by  England  in 
its  outspoken  position.  John  Quincy  Adams  was  Secretary 
of  State,  while  Mr.  Jefferson  and  Mr.  Madison  were,  though 
in  retirement,  still  available  for  consultation  about  great 
policies.  The  Monroe  Doctrine  belonged  to  no  individual, 
but  expressed  the  views  of  all  our  foremost  statesmen.  It 
held  that  America  was  no  longer  to  be  regarded  as  a  field 
for  European  colonial  adventure.  It  was,  in  effect,  a  declara- 
tion that  we  would  defend  the  independence  of  the  new 
Latin-American  republics,  that  we  were  opposed  to  the 
transfer  of  remaining  American  colonies  from  one  European 
sovereign  to  another,  and  that  we  regarded  the  Western 
Hemisphere  as  in  process  of  evolving  a  series  of  self-govern- 
ing states,  which  should  adopt  our  ideals  of  peace  and 
democratic  equality,  and  should  be  free  from  the  militarism 
of  Europe  and  its  surviving  feudal  institutions. 

The  second  war  with  England  had  settled  no  specific 
questions  in  controversy,  but  it  had  done  a  great  deal  to 
nationalize  the  spirit  of  the  country.  It  had  given  us  free- 
dom and  prestige  on  the  high  seas;  it  had  taught  Europe 
to  respect  us  and  believe  in  our  permanence ;  it  had  ended 
those  colonial  traditions  and  prejudices  which  had  given 
us  French  parties  and  English  parties  in  our  domestic 


t 
PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     227 

politics;  it  had  destroyed  the  first  secessionist  movement, 
namely,  that  of  New  England  as  centered  in  the  Hartford 
convention;  it  had  advertised  and  popularized  our  recent 
purchase  of  the  Louisiana  country  through  our  military 
victory  at  New  Orleans  and  our  assertion  of  exclusive  con- 
trol over  Mississippi  navigation;  and  it  had  brought  for- 
ward a  new  set  of  statesmen,  —  notable  among  them  being 
Jackson,  the  military  hero  of  New  Orleans;  Clay  and  Cal- 
houn;  with  men  like  Crawford,  Webster,  and  Benton  soon 
to  appear  as  national  leaders. 

We  had  finally  purchased  Florida  from  the  Spaniards,  and 
were  engaged  in  a  triangular  diplomatic  dispute  with  Russia 
and  England  over  the  Oregon  country.  While  we  were 
completing  the  diplomacy  for  the  extension  of  our  domain, 
with  an  instinct  for  scientific  frontiers  and  continental 
integrity,  these  questions  were  always  mixed  up  in  their 
motives  with  the  divisive  and  sectional  character  of  our 
domestic  politics.  The  Northeast  was  naturally  concerned 
about  Maine,  the  St.  Lawrence  River,  and  our  fishing  rights 
in  Canadian  waters  and  off  the  coasts  of  Newfoundland. 
To  our  people  pressing  westward,  the  Oregon  question  seemed 
important.  To  our  new  Southwest,  relations  with  Mexico 
and  Spain  bulked  large  in  political v  significance.  To 
the  Carolinas  and  Florida  the  future  of  Cuba  and  all 
the  developments  in  the  West  Indies  and  to  the  south- 
ward were  matters  of  concern  and  anxiety. 

Nationalism  and  sectionalism  were  growing  side  by  side, 
with  strange  admixtures  of  motive  and  curious  results  upon 
public  policy.  Compromise  statesmanship  sought  to  miti- 
gate sectional  feeling,  in  the  hope  that  time  might  lessen 
the  tendency  to  division,  while  increasing  national  power 
and  influence.  I  have  shown  in  previous  pages  how  the 


228    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

acquisition  of  Texas  for  slave  territory  led  to  the  pur- 
chase of  California  for  freedom.  The  long  contest  over  the 
Oregon  country  was  settled  by  a  diplomatic  compromise 
which  was  infinitely  better  than  war,  however  disappoint- 
ing to  those  Americans  who  claimed  a  much  larger  strip  of 
country  west  of  Lake  Superior. 

This  settlement  came  at  a  time  when  the  South  was 
friendly  to  England  through  reason  of  its  expanding  cotton 
trade;  and  our  own  sectional  animosities  stood  in  the  way 
of  our  securing  in  the  far  Northwest  a  boundary  line  which 
could  have  been  asserted  with  success,  in  all  probability, 
if  we  had  been  harmonious  among  ourselves.  As  one 
studies  the  rather  inglorious  chapters  of  our  political  and 
diplomatic  history  in  the  period  from  1825  to  1860,  it  seems 
a  matter  of  good  fortune  and  of  adventitious  circumstance, 
rather  than  of  consistent  statesmanship,  that  —  excepting 
for  the  Mexican  episode  in  the  forties —  we  were  not  drawn 
into  foreign  war. 

But  all  our  crucial  questions,  domestic  and  foreign  alike, 
were  accumulating  and  were  gradually  shaping  themselves 
along  the  line  of  our  internal  sectional  cleavage.  There 
was  no  way  to  settle  these  things  by  a  foreign  war,  and  so 
we  fought  them  out  among  ourselves.  At  the  end  of  the 
Civil  War  period  we  were  in  position  to  command  the  re- 
spect of  Europe,  and  to  make  our  views  felt  in  all  matters 
that  concerned  our  outside  relationships. 

In  the  first  year  of  our  war,  England,  France,  and  Spain 
had  jointly  agreed  to  intervene  in  Mexico  and  change  the 
government  of  that  republic  on  slight  pretexts  of  debts 
neglected  and  grievances  of  private  citizens  unredressed. 
Mr.  Seward,  as  Secretary  of  State,  could  protest  in  a  dig- 
nified way  in  diplomatic  correspondence,  but  we  were 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     229 

powerless  to  do  anything  else.  Meanwhile,  England  and 
Spain  disagreed  with  France,  and  Napoleon  III  pursued 
the  adventure  alone,  making  a  successful  invasion  and 
placing  Maximilian  of  Austria  in  power  as  dynastic  head 
of  a  new  Mexican  empire. 

At  the  close  of  the  war,  General  Grant  sent  an  army  to 
the  Rio  Grande  to  support  the  Mexican  patriots,  the  French 
troops  were  withdrawn  from  the  country,  Maximilian's 
imperialist  movement  came  to  a  fatal  end,  and  the  Mexican 
republic  was  reestablished  under  our  auspices  and  protec- 
tion. We  were  forgiven  at  last  for  having  taken  Texas 
and  California,  and  Europe  discovered  more  about  the 
Monroe  Doctrine  through  a  concrete  lesson  than  could 
possibly  have  been  learned  through  volumes  of  dissertation 
or  diplomatic  correspondence. 

England,  through  our  war  period,  had  been  in  a  state 
of  divided  sentiment.  Obviously,  our  blockade  of  Southern 
ports  and  our  creation  of  England's  cotton  famine  had 
brought  immense  loss  and  distress  upon  that  country. 
Our  commerce,  in  turn,  had  suffered  from  Confederate 
cruisers  and  privateers  in  the  equipment  of  which  the  South 
had  made  use  of  private  British  aid,  and  we  claimed  that 
this  might  have  been  prevented  by  greater  vigilance  on 
the  part  of  the  British  government.  Canada,  meanwhile, 
throughout  the  war,  had  been  sympathetic  toward  the 
cause  of  the  North.  The  Southern  statesmen  felt  that 
England  had  given  them  encouragement  and  made  them 
promises  which  were  wholly  unfulfilled.  Thus,  at  the  end 
of  the  contest  in  1865,  the  North  had  its  deep  grievances 
against  England,  while  the  South  was  almost  equally  bitter. 

That  was  the  moment  when  statesmanship  failed  us, 
with  the  assassination  of  Mr.  Lincoln  —  the  greatest  single 


230    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

disaster  that  ever  befell  our  country.  Mr.  Lincoln  would 
have  enlisted  the  cooperation  of  General  Lee  and  the  best 
minds  of  the  South;  would  have  restored  the  Southern 
states  in  a  spirit  of  brotherhood ;  would  have  avoided  the 
mistake  of  immediate  negro  suffrage  and  its  attendant  Re- 
construction horrors;  would  have  used  Southern  rather 
than  Northern  troops  to  cause  the  expulsion  of  the  French 
from  Mexico.  He  would  have  been  prepared  to  meet  the 
questions  at  issue  with  England  with  a  united  country 
behind  him  greatly  superior  at  that  moment  in  its  military 
and  naval  strength  to  any  other  power  in  the  world.  But 
after  the  death  of  Lincoln,  our  statesmanship  dragged  itself 
through  a  morass  of  sectional  bitterness  and  fallacy  and 
purely  futile  coercion,  and  could  not  find  those  moments 
of  calm  vision  necessary  to  a  just  forecast  of  the  future. 

The  British  government  was  sufficiently  apologetic  and 
regretful.  At  that  time  the  Dominion  of  Canada  had  not 
been  formed.  The  British  provinces  in  North  America  were 
separate  from  each  other.  All  the  country  west  of  the 
province  of  Ontario  was  merely  a  hunting  and  trapping 
wilderness  in  which  the  Hudson  Bay  Company  bought 
furs,  trafficked  with  the  Indians,  and  exercised  govern- 
ment. Mr.  Sewardhad,  indeed,  a  capacity  for  large  views, 
and  at  a  fortunate  moment  he  improved  the  opportunity 
to  buy  Alaska  from  the  Russians.  The  British  govern- 
ment, in  token  of  good-will  and  to  repair  all  errors  of  the 
past,  offered  to  give  us  its  great  territories  of  the  Northwest, 
which  would  have  added  almost  as  much  to  our  domain 
as  the  entire  extent  of  the  United  States. 

In  our  blindness  and  fatuity,  we  preferred  a  lawsuit  to 
collect  damages  for  Confederate  inroads  upon  our  com- 
merce, —  due,  as  we  claimed,  indirectly  to  British  negli- 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     231 

gence  in  preventing  the  Confederates  from  fitting  out  a 
few  commerce-destroyers  in  British  ports.  At  that  time 
the  Canadian  colonies  exercised  no  jurisdiction  over  the 
British  Northwestern  country,  and  made  no  pretense  of 
even  a  moral  claim  to  it.  As  I  have  said,  with  intentional 
repetition,  one  of  the  greatest  objects  of  a  far-seeing  national 
statesmanship,  is  the  acquisition  of  contiguous,  unoccupied 
territory,  for  purposes  of  national  expansion.  Jefferson 
had  strained  the  Constitution  to  make  the  Louisiana  Pur- 
chase, and  had  sent  the  Lewis  and  Clark  Expedition  to  the 
Columbia  River  and  the  Oregon  country  at  a  period  when 
our  movement  of  settlement  had  scarcely  crossed  the  Alle- 
ghanies  and  the  Blue  Ridge.  But  sixty  years  later,  after 
we  had  acquired  California,  chartered  the  transcontinental 
railroads,  developed  Oregon,  and  were  purchasing  Alaska, 
our  public  men  declined  to  accept  as  a  free  gift  those  vast 
and  noble  regions  which  now  comprise  Manitoba,  British 
Columbia,  the  intervening  province  of  Alberta,  the  great 
wheat-growing  country  called  Saskatchewan,  and  the  min- 
eral wealth  of  the  Yukon. 

Further  than  that,  the  British  government  was  prepared 
to  settle,  in  a  generous  spirit,  all  the  long-standing  questions 
about  fishing  rights  and  many  other  matters  of  detail  that 
had  survived  in  the  Northeast  from  the  Revolutionary 
period.  But  not  to  stop  there,  Great  Britain  was  quite 
willing  to  go  the  final  length,  and  give  its  consent  to  our 
annexation  of  the  Maritime  Provinces,  Upper  and  Lower 
Canada,  and  Newfoundland.  It  was  a  period  of  such 
friendly  sentiments  toward  us  on  the  part  of  the  Canadian 
colonies,  and  of  such  need  on  their  part  of  close  trade  rela- 
tions with  us,  that  annexation  would  have  been  welcome 
to  them. 


232    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OP  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

War,  whatever  the  excuses  for  it,  is  attended  by  many 
penalties.  One  of  the  greatest  penalties  we  have  had  to 
pay  has  been  in  the  obscuring  of  our  perceptions  as  to 
wise  and  far-reaching  policies.  In  the  bitterness  of  sec- 
tionalism and  in  the  stress  of  a  vicious  political  life  tainted 
by  the  venality  and  corruption  of  the  speculative  period 
following  the  Civil  War,  wisdom  was  dismissed,  and  the 
spirit  of  foresight  was  wholly  lost.  A  constructive  states- 
manship would  have  helped  to  put  the  South  on  its  feet 
and  would  have  acquired  the  whole  of  British  North  America 
in  an  atmosphere  of  universal  good-will.  But  nations,  as 
individuals,  have  to  learn  wisdom  through  discipline  of 
hard  experience;  and,  where  a  better  destiny  fails  them 
through  their  inability  to  rise  to  their  supreme  opportu- 
nities, they  must  do  the  best  they  can  with  the  narrower 
chances  that  will  come  to  them  when,  at  later  periods, 
they  have  recovered  somewhat  the  ability  to  see  clearly 
and  act  sensibly. 

We  made  the  treaty  of  Washington  with  England  and 
set  up  the  Geneva  arbitration  under  which  we  recovered  a 
few  millions  of  dollars.  We  had  established  arbitration  as 
a  method  of  settling  differences  with  England,  in  conse- 
quence of  which  we  lost  and  paid  an  absurd  price  in  a 
later  arbitration  to  settle  the  claims  of  Canadian  fishermen 
against  us,  while,  years  afterward,  we  lost  again  in  a  conten- 
tion regarding  the  Alaska  fur-bearing  seals.  At  a  far  later 
date  we  settled  the  dispute  about  the  Alaska  boundary  by 
means  of  a  tribunal  which  we  knew  in  advance  would  ratify 
our  claim  to  a  continuous  Alaska  coast-line,  which  we  should 
not  in  any  case  have  surrendered. 

All  these  contentions  which  have  entered  more  or  less 
into  our  political  life,  which  have  affected  our  tariff  contro- 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION    233 

versies,  and  which  have  endangered  our  foreign  relations  on 
several  occasions,  would  have  been  settled  in  a  final  and 
comprehensive  way  if  we  had  accepted  the  whole  of  British 
North  America  at  the  end  of  our  Civil  War  and  had  devoted 
ourselves  to  the  harmonious  up-building  of  the  North 
American  continent. 

There  would  never  have  arisen  any  further  question  as 
to  the  extension  of  our  domains.  Our  ideals  of  a  homo- 
geneous people,  using  the  same  language  and  governing 
themselves  in  communities  based  upon  British  institu- 
tions with  the  customs  and  principles  of  the  common  law, 
would  have  been  promoted  in  the  largest  possible  way. 
Our  friendliness  with  Great  Britain  would  have  been 
assured,  because  no  questions  of  dispute  would  have  re- 
mained. 

But  our  politicians  rejected  this  large  opportunity  to  settle 
all  foreign  questions  and  to  fix  forever  our  destinies  as  the 
foremost  power  of  the  world.  Instead  of  this,  they  nagged 
England  on  all  occasions,  encouraged  Irish  Fenianism,  and 
alienated  the  Canadians,  our  natural  friends,  by  a  harsh 
commercial  policy.  Our  treaty  of  reciprocity  with  Canada 
expired  in  1866,  and  we  failed  to  renew  it.  Whatever  had 
been  its  merits  or  its  faults  from  the  standpoint  of  com- 
mercial details,  there  were  large  social  and  political  ad- 
vantages arising  from  close  relations  with  Canada.  And  it 
had  been  the  general  opinion  that  at  some  moment  when 
the  British  government  found  sufficient  reason  for  willing- 
ness to  withdraw  from  North  America,  the  Canadian 
provinces  would  gladly  enter  our  Union  as  states  through 
natural  affinity,  and  through  gravitation  of  a  sort  even 
stronger  than  that  which  had  brought  Texas  and  Califor- 
nia into  the  American  fold. 


234   POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

But  the  dominant  politics  at  Washington,  after  Lincoln's 
death,  occupied  itself  with  the  attempt  to  impeach  President 
Johnson,  to  reconstruct  the  South  on  a  false  basis,  to  develop 
and  exploit  the  West  in  a  spirit  subsequently  revealed  by 
the  Credit  Mobilier  investigations,  and  to  encourage  the 
new  protectionist  movement  at  the  very  point  where  it 
was  most  to  be  deprecated.  Much,  indeed,  might  be  said 
for  the  broad  tariff  theories  of  those  who  desired  to  stimu- 
late our  major  lines  of  manufacture  —  iron  and  steel  prod- 
ucts, textiles,  pottery,  glass,  and  the  like.  But  to  turn 
all  the  permanent  forces  of  Canada's  economic  development 
away  from  normal  lines  for  the  sake  of  excluding  a  few 
fishermen  and  farmers  from  our  markets,  was  to  travesty 
the  principles  of  protectionism. 

Our  one  great  opportunity  for  expansion  lay  to  the 
northward,  where,  until  a  few  years  ago,  there  was  no  settle- 
ment or  development  of  any  consequence  except  within  a 
narrow  zone  along  our  own  frontier.  One  fatuous  policy 
after  another,  upon  our  part,  has  now  indefinitely  postponed 
the  possibility  of  our  Northern  and  Northwestern  growth. 
The  sons  of  our  Western  farmers  are  flocking  by  the  scores 
of  thousands  into  the  Canadian  Northwest;  and  they  will 
help  to  build  up  Canadian  provinces  rather  than  American 
states.  It  would  have  been  better  for  everybody  con- 
cerned to  have  had  one  great  nation  occupying  our  conti- 
nent north  of  the  Mexican  line.  Until  recently  it  was  an 
ideal  of  easy  realization.  Each  year,  as  it  passes,  makes 
that  solution  more  difficult  and  less  probable.  The  re- 
sources of  Canada  will  be  developed  chiefly  by  the  capital 
and  energy  of  the  citizens  of  the  United  States,  and  we  shall 
lose  to  another  power  —  just  as  Europe  has  lost  to  us  —  in 
the  transfer  of  money,  men,  and  productive  energy. 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     235 

Under  the  circumstances,  there  remains  for  the  time  being 
only  one  thing  to  do ;  namely,  to  settle  detailed  questions 
of  difference  with  Canada,  to  promote  the  best  possible 
relations,  and  to  encourage  rather  than  discourage  mutual 
trade  and  intercourse  of  all  kinds,  on  the  sound  principle 
that  one's  nearest  neighbors  should  be  one's  best  and  most 
useful  friends.  But  an  artificial  frontier  two  or  three 
thousand  miles  long  —  stretching  across  a  wilderness 
which  we  ourselves  had  the  energy  and  means  to  develop 
with  a  rapidity  unprecedented  in  the  history  of  the  world  - 
should  never  have  been  allowed  to  become  hardened  and 
established  as  a  permanent  dividing  line  between  nations 
whose  trade  policies  would  thereby  have  to  abandon  their 
natural  courses. 

The  Monroe  Doctrine,  meanwhile,  has  had  its  further 
development  until  it  is  no  longer  to  be  explained  by  mere 
reference  to  the  language  of  1823  or  to  the  situations  that 
then  existed.  As  it  has  grown,  it  may  be  termed  an  ex- 
pression of  the  feeling  of  the  people  of  the  United  States 
about  the  conditions  and  destinies  of  the  Western  Hemi- 
sphere as  a  whole,  made  influential  by  concrete  tests.  It 
does  not  pledge  us  to  any  line  of  action  in  a  given  case, 
and  it  is  not  inconsistent  with  any  line  of  policy  we  may 
choose  to  adopt  in  our  relations  with  other  parts  of  the 
world. 

We  have  always  recognized  the  fact  that  Europe  would 
trade  extensively  with  all  American  countries,  would  have 
some  difficulties  with  them,  and  some  complex  relationships. 
We  have  always  been  tolerant  of  the  fact  that  European 
colonies  had  survived  in  America  from  an  earlier  period. 
But  our  general  attitude  has  been  opposed  to  reconquests 
or  further  extensions  of  European  sovereignty,  and  we  have 


236    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

been  openly  favorable  to  the  establishment  of  independent 
governments  of  a  republican  form  throughout  the  Western 
world.  We  have  endeavored  at  different  times  and  in  a 
variety  of  ways  to  promote  the  settlement  of  disputes 
between  Central  and  South  American  powers  and  European 
governments  on  such  a  basis  as  to  avoid  European  naval 
expeditions  and  the  seizure  and  occupancy  of  American 
seaports.  South  American  governments  have  been  so 
turbulent  and  unstable  that  it  has  required  great  tact  and 
effort  on  our  part,  at  the  expense  of  many  misunderstand- 
ings, to  help  them  keep  their  independence  through  the 
period  necessary  for  their  firm  establishment. 

When  the  rest  of  Latinic  America  was  breaking  away 
from  Europe,  the  islands  of  Cuba  and  Porto  Rico  were  held 
by  Spain.  One  revolution  had  succeeded  another  in  Cuba, 
with  much  aid  and  encouragement  privately  rendered  from 
this  country.  And  on  several  occasions  we  had  come  near 
the  point  of  official  intervention.  For  seventy-five  years 
Americans  had  regarded  the  Spanish  yoke  as  temporary, 
and  had  expected  that  Cuba  would  either  become  an  inde- 
pendent republic  or  be  absorbed  by  this  country.  Our 
attitude  toward  Cuba  had  been  affected  not  only  by  the 
geographical  nearness  of  the  island,  but  also  by  our  large 
interest  in  the  sugar  and  tobacco  which  were  the  chief 
export  crops  of  the  island. 

The  Cuban  revolt  of  1895  had  followed,  after  a  lapse  of 
only  a  few  years,  a  ten-years'  struggle  for  independence. 
It  soon  reached  a  form  peculiarly  disastrous  to  all  interests. 
The  revolutionists  had  no  access  to  the  sea,  but  were  safe 
and  strong  in  the  highlands  and  forests  of  the  interior.  The 
Spaniards  accumulated  on  the  island  a  force  of  approxi- 
mately two  hundred  thousand  men.  The  Spaniards  could 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     237 

not  prevail  against  the  tactics  of  an  enemy  that  retreated 
and  fought  no  battles,  and  the  revolutionists  could  neither 
drive  the  Spaniards  from  the  fortified  places  on  the  sea- 
board, nor  prevent  the  bringing  of  recruits  and  supplies  by 
water.  It  was  a  deadlocked  situation  which  resulted  in 
a  maximum  of  suffering  and  gave  no  prospect  of  early 
solution.  Spain  was  exhausting  her  resources  with  no 
honorable  way  of  withdrawal,  and  Cuba  was  the  victim 
of  a  warfare  which  was  destroying  women  and  children. 

The  people  of  the  United  States  could  see  no  solution 
short  of  the  complete  withdrawal  of  Spain  from  the  Western 
Hemisphere.  Spain,  on  the  other  hand,  could  promise 
reforms  of  administration,  but  could  not  give  up  technical 
sovereignty  in  the  West  Indies,  because  any  cabinet  or 
dynasty  at  Madrid  consenting  to  such  surrender  would 
have  been  overthrown  before  the  process  was  complete. 
Whatever,  from  the  standpoint  of  international  law  or 
political  doctrine,  might  have  been  said  by  way  of  excuse 
for  American  intervention,  there  arose  a  tide  of  public 
opinion  which  swept  all  things  before  it.  The  intention  of 
the  American  people  was  not  to  enter  upon  a  quarrel,  but 
to  end  one;  not  to  make  war,  but  to  do  a  piece  of  police 
work  and  establish  conditions  of  stable  peace  where  war 
had  been  more  or  less  chronic  for  three  quarters  of  a  cen- 
tury. In  several  weeks  the  task  was  accomplished.  Cuba 
had  become  a  burden  to  Spain,  and  compulsory  withdrawal 
was  a  merciful  relief  to  the  people  of  the  Iberian  Peninsula 
who  were  paying  not  only  the  heavy  pecuniary  tax  of  the 
war,  but  also  the  heavier  tax  that  made  sacrifice  of  their 
sons  in  the  hopeless  attempt  to  hold  East  Indian  and  West 
Indian  possessions  by  military  force. 

Many  things  have  resulted  from  our  adventure  in  1898 


238    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OP  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

for  the  liberation  of  Cuba.  We  were  compelled  to  reorgan- 
ize our  army  and  to  develop  our  navy.  We  were  drawn 
into  various  currents  of  international  relationship  from 
which  we  had  expected  to  keep  ourselves  relatively  free. 
An  attempt  to  emancipate  Cuba  had  forced  us  to  offensive- 
defensive  action  in  the  Pacific  to  protect  our  coasts  against 
the  Philippine  fleet  of  the  Spaniards.  We  had  destroyed 
that  fleet  at  Manila,  had  come  into  temporary  occupation 
of  the  Philippine  archipelago,  and  in  the  final  settlement 
with  Spain  had  kept  the  Philippine  Islands,  largely  through 
England's  influence,  in  order  to  prevent  their  falling  into 
the  hands  of  some  other  power. 

We  could  easily  have  annexed  Cuba,  and  with  some  show 
of  reason.  But,  at  the  outbreak  of  the  war,  in  order  to 
exhibit  to  the  world  our  disinterestedness,  we  had  denied 
any  purpose  of  conquest.  We  had  not  even  dreamed  of 
such  a  thing  as  acquiring  the  Philippines,  and  our  desire 
for  colonial  empire  was  even  less  than  our  fitness  for  it. 
But,  in  the  end,  we  kept  the  Philippines  through  the  logical 
process  of  excluding  all  other  solutions  one  by  one.  We 
precipitated  thereby  a  great  domestic  political  controversy 
over  an  issue  which  called  itself  "imperialism." 

It  was  a  wholesome  contest,  because  it  forced  us  to  a 
searching  of  hearts  and  a  clarifying  of  motives.  It  drove 
us  to  the  clear  perception  that  the  acquisition  and  govern- 
ment of  outlying  possessions  was  for  us  an  exceptional  and 
an  abnormal  matter,  rather  than  an  orderly  and  desirable 
development  of  our  political  life  and  system.  In  the  great 
debate  of  the  year  1900,  the  country  specifically  accepted 
and  justified  our  Philippine  policy  in  view  of  the  circum- 
stances that  surrounded  it.  But  the  country  held  the  party 
in  power  to  ordinances  of  self-denial  and  altruism,  in  respect 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     239 

of  the  Philippines,  that  were  even  more  exacting  than  those 
accepted  in  the  case  of  Cuba.  We  were  not  to  exploit  the 
Philippines  for  our  own  political  or  commercial  benefit, 
were  not  to  subject  them  to  the  carpet-bag  rule  of  adven- 
turous or  discredited  Americans,  were  not  to  use  them  as 
a  key  to  future  domination  in  the  Pacific. 

Our  principles  of  action  in  the  Philippines  were  defined 
in  the  system  for  governing  them  established  by  Mr.  Root 
as  Secretary  of  War  and  put  into  'operation  by  Mr.  Taft 
as  Governor-General.  It  was  a  policy  for  the  immediate 
creation  of  municipal  and  local  self-governing  units;  for 
the  opening  of  all  positions  in  the  civil  service  by  prefer- 
ence to  native  Filipinos;  for  the  military  policing  of  the 
islands  by  natives;  for  the  universal  establishment  of 
schools;  for  an  improved  administration  of  justice  under 
appropriate  civil  and  penal  codes,  with  native  judges  in 
so  far  as  possible;  for  the  election  of  a  Philippine  legisla- 
ture at  the  earliest  possible  date ;  for  tariff  and  tax  systems 
favorable  to  Philippine  revenue  and  trade,  and  for  the  post- 
ponement of  the  question  of  ultimate  sovereignty  until  the 
Philippines  should  actually  have  come  into  existence  as  a 
political  entity. 

This  Philippine  undertaking  has  already  proved  a  costly 
and  difficult  one,  but  its  lessons  have  been  so  salutary  as 
to  have  justified  it.  It  has  placed  upon  our  government 
delicate  responsibilities,  which  have  changed  our  whole 
attitude  toward  the  world  at  large.  It  has  sobered  and 
dignified  our  diplomacy,  and  has  reacted  very  favorably 
upon  our  political  conditions  at  home.  It  has  led  us  to  a 
deeper  study  of  all  the  problems  of  politics  and  administra- 
tion, and  has  strengthened,  rather  than  weakened,  our  belief 
in  the  old  American  ideal  of  a  homogeneous  republic.  Porto 


240    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Rico  is  comparatively  small,  and  we  can  doubtless  afford  to 
give  the  Porto  Rican  people  as  individuals  the  status  of 
American  citizens,  —  while  developing  in  their  island,  as  in 
the  Hawaiian  group,  a  form  of  republican  self-government 
suited  to  their  conditions,  and  giving  it  a  political  mem- 
bership in  our  sisterhood  of  states  analogous  to  that  of  a 
territory.  But  the  Philippines  are  more  distant,  and  pre- 
sumably have  in  store  a  different  destiny. 

At  some  future  time,  opposing  views  about  that  destiny 
may  take  the  form  of  a  live  political  problem  in  this  coun- 
try. But,  for  the  present,  the  Philippine  question  in  its 
larger  bearing  has  been  met,  and  the  result  has  been 
accepted  by  both  parties.  There  will  be  difference  of  opin- 
ion about  the  extent  of  the  concessions  we  should  grant 
to  Philippine  products  in  our  markets,  and  many  other 
questions  of  detail  will  obtrude  themselves,  and  will  help 
to  round  out  the  programs  of  self-praise  and  of  accusation, 
as  parties  wage  their  periodical  campaigns. 

The  fact  that  we  were  present  in  the  Philippines  with  a 
considerable  military  force,  enabled  us  to  take  an  impor- 
tant part  in  the  joint  expedition  of  the  Powers  which  fol- 
lowed the  Boxer  uprising  against  foreigners  in  China.  It 
enabled  us  also  to  exert  more  influence  than  we  should 
otherwise  have  had  on  behalf  of  what  was  called  the  "  open 
door"  in  China  at  a  time  when  Russia  seemed  on  the  point 
of  annexing  Manchuria  and  Korea,  with  a  view  to  monopo- 
lizing their  trade.  It  gave  us  added  weight  in  the  making 
of  international  opinion  against  the  dismemberment  of  the 
Chinese  Empire. 

Not  least  important  of  the  events  and  policies  that  fol- 
lowed our  undertaking  on  behalf  of  Cuba,  was  the  determi- 
nation that  an  isthmian  canal  must  be  built,  and  that  it 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     241 

must  be  under  the  political  guarantee  and  control  of  the 
United  States.  In  a  period  before  the  Civil  War,  when  a 
canal  project  seemed  likely  to  be  realized,  England  and 
the  United  States  signed  the  so-called  "  Bulwer-Clayton 
Treaty,"  which  was  meant  to  secure  political  neutrality  for 
the  canal,  the  other  great  powers  of  Europe  being  expected 
to  add  their  signatures  to  the  treaty.  The  agreement 
covered  various  matters,  the  terms  of  which  were  at  once 
disregarded  by  both  powers.  The  document  was  never 
urged  upon  the  continental  countries  for  their  signature. 
The  immediate  project  of  canal  digging  to  which  it  referred 
was  abandoned.  The  treaty  existed  merely  as  a  paper 
instrument  which,  according  to  official  declarations  of 
many  American  Presidents  and  Secretaries  of  State,  had 
never  gone  into  effect,  and  was  not  to  be  regarded  as  of 
any  validity. 

In  the  seventies  and  eighties,  American  capitalists  un- 
dertook to  secure  construction  of  the  canal  by  the  Nica- 
ragua route,  while  M.  de  Lesseps,  the  builder  of  the  Suez 
Canal,  under  a  concession  from  Colombia,  was  entering  with 
great  enthusiasm  upon  the  project  of  a  canal  across  the 
Isthmus  of  Panama.  Both  of  these  projects  proved  too 
large  for  private  capitalists.  The  French  Company  had 
spent  fabulous  sums,  and  failed  under  scandalous  circum- 
stances. Such  was  the  situation  when  an  American  battle- 
ship on  our  Pacific  coast  made  its  memorable  voyage 
around  the  continent  of  South  America  in  order  to  join 
our  fleet  in  Cuban  waters.  The  same  sort  of  irresistible 
public  opinion  which  had  driven  us  to  liberate  Cuba  forced 
the  government  to  adopt  the  policy  of  building  an  isthmian 
canal  as  a  part  of  our  shore  line  for  purposes  of  defense. 

I  am  speaking  of  political  policy,  and  not  of  matters  less 


242    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

essentially  related  thereto.  And  so  I  shall  not  dwell  upon 
those  chapters  of  recent  history  which  led  to  our  abandon- 
ment of  the  Nicaragua  route  after  we  had  chosen  it,  and 
to  our  purchase  from  the  French  Company  of  its  assets  and 
rights  at  Panama.  Nor  shall  I  discuss  the  mistake  of  the 
first  Hay-Pauncefote  treaty,  which,  in  abrogating — for 
purposes  of  good  form  —  the  discredited  Bulwer-Clayton 
convention,  went  much  farther  and  provided  that  a  canal 
to  be  constructed  at  the  cost  of  the  United  States  Treasury 
should  be  neutralized  under  the  political  guarantee  of  all 
the  maritime  powers  of  Europe.  The  treaty  was  revised, 
and  we  retained  the  right,  which  in  any  case  we  should 
have  exercised,  to  control  our  own  canal;  although  we 
solemnly  pledged  ourselves  to  do  what  no  one  had  asked  of 
us,  namely,  to  give  all  powers,  for  their  ships  of  war  as  well 
as  of  commerce,  exactly  the  same  use  of  the  canal  as  we 
retained  for  ourselves. 

We  had  failed  after  the  war  between  the  states  to  avail 
ourselves  of  our  easy  opportunity  to  fix  forever  the  form 
of  our  development  by  acquiring  British  North  America. 
We  were  now,  after  our  war  with  Spain,  in  a  mood  of 
domestic  harmony.  Sectionalism  no  longer  disturbed  our 
grasp  upon  larger  policies.  The  determination  to  build 
an  isthmian  canal  of  some  sort,  like  the  first  vote  of  money 
for  the  Cuban  expedition,  was  with  almost  absolute  unani- 
mity in  Congress.  We  had  acquired  Porto  Rico,  had  se- 
cured coaling  and  naval  stations  from  Cuba,  and  had  pro- 
vided for  a  Cuban  republic  under  the  terms  of  what  was 
virtually  an  American  protectorate.  We  had  acquired  the 
Hawaiian  Islands,  Guam,  and  the  Philippines.  The  com- 
pletion of  our  larger  policy  required  an  isthmian  canal  under 
our  own  control,  as  a  virtual  extension  of  our  coast-line. 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     243 

To  construct  such  a  canal  did  not  mean  that  we  should 
annex  the  republics  north  of  it  nor  unduly  dominate  those 
south  of  it.  But  it  meant,  of  necessity,  an  important  devel- 
opment of  our  policy  toward  those  republics,  and  toward 
the  future  of  the  West  Indies  and  the  Caribbean  Sea.  It 
was,  in  every  sense,  to  the  interest  of  the  South  American 
Republic  of  Colombia  to  have  our  government  purchase 
the  assets  of  the  failed  French  Company  and  build  the 
Panama  Canal.  But  the  government  of  Colombia  at  that 
moment  was  neither  responsible  nor  representative,  and  it 
adopted  a  mercenary  policy  which  defeated  its  own  objects. 
The  Isthmus  of  Panama  declared  its  independence  from 
Colombia,  our  government  promptly  recognized  and  pro- 
tected its  withdrawal,  the  canal  zone  was  purchased  from 
the  new  government  at  Panama  rather  than  from  the 
authorities  at  Bogota,  the  Republic  of  Panama  was  estab- 
lished under  our  auspices  and  virtual  guarantee,  and  the 
President  proceeded  to  carry  on  the  work  of  construction 
where  the  French  Company  had  left  it  off. 

The  completion  of  the  canal  must  have  a  profound  effect 
upon  our  future  development  as  well  as  upon  that  of  other 
countries.  It  will  have  a  tendency  to  bring  the  turbulent 
Central-American  republics  into  a  state  of  order  necessary 
to  their  economic  development.  It  would  seem  not  im- 
probable that  they  might  be  led  to  a  permanent  confedera- 
tion in  union  with  the  Republic  of  Panama,  under  the 
same  sort  of  guarantee  for  internal  order  and  sound  finance 
as  now  protects  both  Panama  and  Cuba.  It  is  to  be 
assumed,  further,  that  our  close  relations  with  Mexico 
will  develop  of  themselves  without  need  of  written  guar- 
antees. As  respects  San  Domingo  and  Haiti,  our  natural 
policy  will  be  one  of  endeavor  to  save  them  from  too 


244    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

frequent  revolutions  at  home,  and  financial  misadventures 
abroad.  The  ratification  of  the  San  Domingo  treaty 
early  in  1907  was  more  significant  than  was  commonly 
understood.  That  treaty  will  enable  us  to  protect  finan- 
cial interests  and  to  aid  in  the  orderly  progress  of  a  rich 
but  turbulent  island  republic. 

As  for  Venezuela  and  Colombia,  our  desire  will  be  to 
help  keep  them  afloat  as  republics  until  able  and  wise 
men  safely  control  their  destinies.  It  is  to  be  expected 
that  the  growth  of  their  economic  interests  may  give  them, 
for  a  time,  a  stability  like  that  of  Mexico,  after  which  they 
may  develop  a  citizenship  much  more  capable  than  at  pres- 
ent of  keeping  domestic  peace  and  carrying  on  the  institu- 
tions of  government.  As  Brazil  and  the  Argentine  Repub- 
lic and  Chili  go  forward  in  their  present  development  of 
wealth  and  political  stability,  the  Monroe  Doctrine,  so  far 
as  they  are  concerned,  will  mean  only  a  friendly  recognition 
of  the  earlier  good  intentions  of  the  United  States.  As  the 
ideals  of  peace  and  justice  advance  in  the  world,  republics 
situated  like  these  three  have  less  and  ever  less  to  fear  from 
external  foes. 

It  was  a  serious  moment  when  President  Cleveland  and 
Mr.  Olney  took  steps  which  made  it  necessary  for  England 
and  Venezuela  to  accept  arbitration  in  order  to  fix  a  per- 
manent and  final  boundary  line  between  the  helpless 
republic  and  the  ever  encroaching  colony  of  British  Guiana. 
But  it  was  an  instance  in  the  assertion  of  the  Monroe  Doc- 
trine that  was  salutary  in  the  end.  It  has  led  to  a  suc- 
cessive rectification  of  frontiers  in  South  America  and 
North  America  by  diplomatic  negotiation,  and  in  several 
cases  by  arbitration,  with  the  result  of  doing  away  with 
differences  which  might  have  led  to  war.  It  was  a  step, 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     245 

furthermore,  which  made  it  easier  for  a  later  adminis- 
tration to  end  a  European  raid  upon  Venezuela  — with 
a  blockade  and  a  prospective  seizure  of  territory  —  on 
the  pretext  of  collecting  various  private  debts.  The  au- 
thority of  our  government  caused  the  withdrawal  of  the 
expedition,  the  submission  of  pecuniary  claims  to  proper 
tribunals,  and  the  payment  of  the  awards  by  an  orderly 
process. 

Such  steps  on  the  part  of  our  government  will  help  to 
bring  about  permanent  conditions  of  peace  and  order  in 
the  world  through  the  establishment  of  right  doctrines 
respecting  governmental  intervention  in  matters  of  private 
business.  Our  South  American  neighbors  have  developed 
principles  and  ideals  of  law,  government,  and  international 
relationship  that  are  far  in  advance  of  the  average  condi- 
tions of  their  citizenship.  But  the  ideals  of  leadership 
may  greatly  affect  in  the  end  the  training  of  a  body  of 
citizens  capable  of  social  self-control  and  of  the  working 
of  political  institutions.  It  is  no  time  to  lose  faith  in 
democratic  government,  whether  for  ourselves  or  for  other 
nations.  On  the  contrary,  we  have  arrived  at  a  period  in 
our  national  progress  when  it  would  seem  possible  for  us  to 
advance  along  the  lines  of  those  principles  with  better 
assurance  and  less  agitation  than  at  any  previous  moment. 

We  were  able  to  carry  out  our  Cuban  policy  with  good 
effect,  because  it  had  the  overwhelming  approval  of  our  own 
public  opinion  regardless  of  party.  Our  latest  intervention 
in  the  affairs  of  Cuba  has  been  effective  through  its  reason- 
ableness, its  practical  usefulness,  and  the  unbroken  support 
it  has  received  from  every  right-minded  organ  of  American 
opinion.  If  the  Democrats  should  succeed  the  Republicans 
in  power,  they  could  do  nothing  else  for  Porto  Rico,  Hawaii, 


246    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

or  the  Philippines  than  to  emulate  the  present  administra- 
tion in  its  sincere  effort  to  promote  human  well-being  in 
those  island  dependencies. 

The  completion  of  the  Panama  Canal  will  benefit  all 
nations,  and  it  will  come  in  the  fullness  of  time  for  our  own 
developments  of  trade.  It  will  give  us  convenient  access 
to  the  South  American  and  Oriental  seaports  at  a  time  when 
the  further  development  of  our  manufactures  will  make  it 
necessary  for  us  to  apply  ourselves  in  earnest  to  the  culti- 
vation of  our  foreign  commerce.  It  will  strengthen  us  in 
the  strategic  sense,  because  it  will  enable  our  ships  of  war 
to  pass  quickly  from  our  Atlantic  to  our  Pacific  coast.  It 
will  bring  us  into  closer  relations  with  South  America  in 
ways  that  will  strengthen  our  influence  and  aid  in  the  stable 
progress  of  Brazil  and  the  Spanish-speaking  republics. 

Our  recent  experiences  have  been  useful  in  that  they  have 
sufficed  to  show  us  that  we  do  not  wish  to  extend  our  gov- 
ernmental authority  any  further  if  we  can  avoid  it,  with  the 
one  great  exception  of  our  growing  willingness  to  join  for- 
tunes with  Canada,  if,  at  some  future  time,  the  Dominion 
should  so  desire.  At  present,  the  Dominion  is  in  a  position 
at  once  very  favorable  and  very  uncertain.  Belonging 
nominally  to  the  British  Empire,  it  is  under  the  protec- 
tion of  England's  great  fleet.  But  its  chief  protection 
lies  in  the  policy  and  the  good-will  of  the  United  States. 
So  long  as  Canada  avoids  participation  in  Old  World 
broils  and  disputes,  this  country  can  permit  no  foreign 
power  to  interfere  with  the  Dominion's  peace  and  self- 
directed  activities. 

England  has  vast  interests  in  all  parts  of  the  world. 
Canada  has  had  no  part  in  the  creation  of  those  interests, 
and  none  whatever  in  their  management  or  control,  nor 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     247 

have  they  ministered  in  any  way  to  her  profit  or  security. 
With  England's  adventure  against  Dutch  republics  in  South 
Africa,  Canada  had  no  proper  relationship  of  any  sort.  It 
was  a  fundamental  error  of  the  most  dangerous  kind  for 
Canada  to  send  troops  to  South  Africa,  and  thus  take  a 
voluntary  part  in  the  war  of  a  great  empire  against  two 
minute  republics.  For  it  is  obvious,  on  a  moment's  reflec- 
tion, that  Germany  or  some  other  European  power  might 
have  become  involved  in  the  contest  against  England,  and 
Canada's  meddling  in  the  strife  would  have  justified  a 
transfer  of  the  scene  of  hostilities  to  North  America.  But 
nothing  could  be  more  fundamentally  contrary  to  the  policy 
under  which  we  tolerate  the  political  separateness  of  the 
country  north  of  us,  than  the  habit  of  participation  in 
European,  Asiatic,  and  African  wars. 

If  Canada  may  join  England  in  foreign  wars  over  ques- 
tions thai  do  not  concern  Canada,  the  result,  under  the 
established  rules  of  international  law,  might  be  the  con- 
quest of  a  part  or  the  whole  of  the  Dominion  by  a  European 
power  or  coalition.  But  this,  in  turn,  would  disturb  the 
reasonable  conditions  of  tranquillity  which  we  have  pre- 
scribed for  the  proper  development  of  North  America.  So 
long  as  England  is  at  peace,  Canada  is  in  a  favorable  posi- 
tion, because  her  security  is  jointly  guaranteed  by  England 
and  the  United  States.  But  if  Canada  should  regard  her- 
self as  a  militant  vassal  of  the  chief  naval  power  of  Europe, 
her  position  might,  at  some  future  time,  cause  us  very  seri- 
ous disturbance. 

From  her  own  standpoint,  Canada  has  four  possible 
futures.  From  our  standpoint,  she  has  only  two.  As 
it  appears  at  Ottawa,  she  may,  first,  continue  in  the  pres- 
ent anomalous  and  ill-defined  relationship  to  the  British 


248    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

Empire;  second,  she  may  take  a  representative  and  re- 
sponsible part  in  helping  to  govern  the  British  Empire, 
along  the  line  of  Mr.  Chamberlain's  imperial  federation 
projects;  third,  she  may  become  an  independent  member 
of  the  family  of  nations,  having  close  relations  with  Eng- 
land and  the  United  States,  but  exercising  full  sovereignty 
on  her  own  behalf ;  or,  fourth,  she  may  return  to  the  views 
of  thirty  years  ago  and  accept  annexation. 

From  the  standpoint  of  the  development  of  our  policy, 
on  the  other  hand,  Canada,  must  cut  loose  from  European 
political  ties  and  accept  full  responsibility  as  a  member  of 
the  family  of  nations,  or  else  merge  her  political  destinies 
with  ours.  As  I  have  said,  we  missed  the  opportunity  for 
an  ideal  solution  forty  years  ago,  and  all  parties  at  interest 
must  now  await  — in  patience  and  with  friendliness  and 
self-control,  though  some  dread  may  attend  the  waiting  - 
the  arrival  of  that  inevitable  crisis  which  will  compel 
Canada  to  make  a  decision. 

We  have  come  to  a  period  when  the  complexity  of  human 
interests  makes  strife  of  all  kinds  too  costly  and  undesirable 
to  be  entertained  in  a  spirit  of  recklessness.  As  I  have 
tried  to  show  in  all  these  discussions,  our  citizenship  is  spe- 
cializing and  perfecting  its  instruments  of  government,  while 
the  government  is  ever  trying  to  build  up  an  effective 
citizenship.  We  seek  in  the  field  of  domestic  politics  to 
reduce  by  all  reasonable  means  the  areas  of  controversy. 
The  supreme  effort  of  our  administration  at  the  present 
moment,  is  so  to  mediate  between  the  conflicting  forces 
of  our  industrial  and  economic  life  as  to  prevent  the  hard- 
ening of  antagonisms  and  the  development  of  another 
political  contest  as  extreme  and  as  intense  as  the  money 
fight,  and  others  through  which  we  have  already  passed. 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION     249 

With  these  efforts  to  keep  our  internal  political  life  sane, 
moderate,  reasonable,  and  progressive,  a  like  tendency  is 
observable  in  our  relationships  toward  other  countries. 
The  ideals  of  nationalism  still  hold  men  firmly,  and  we  shall 
not  make  progress  toward  world  harmony  in  our  age  from 
any  other  standpoint.  Russia  will  insist  upon  develop- 
ment as  a  Russian  nationality,  irrespective  of  those  political 
convulsions  which  attend  her  efforts  to  modernize  her  insti- 
tutions. United  Italy,  united  Germany,  triumphant  Japan, 
and  France  despite  all  drawbacks,  choose  to  face  the  future 
in  their  distinct  and  separate  r61es  as  nations,  impelled  by 
their  own  aims  and  held  together  by  their  own  bonds  of 
association,  making  up  what,  in  our  first  chapter,  we  dis- 
cussed as  constituting  the  modern  state. 

We  in  the  United  States  must  accept  the  responsibility 
of  a  great  place  among  the  nations.  We  must  be  strong 
for  the  sake  of  our  destiny,  our  dignity,  our  influence,  and 
our  usefulness.  The  fact  that  we  have  a  beneficial  theory 
of  progress  for  the  Western  Hemisphere  republics,  which 
we  sometimes  exemplify  in  practical  emergencies,  and  which 
we  call  the  Monroe  Doctrine,  cannot  divest  us  of  one  single 
shred  of  the  responsibility  that  may  fall  to  us  in  helping  to 
work  out  in  an  orderly  and  peaceful  way  the  problems  of 
the  Pacific  Ocean  and  the  Farther  East.  It  was  our  mission 
to  introduce  Japan  to  the  nations  of  the  Western  world, 
and  our  relations  with  Korea  and  China  have  been  excep- 
tional in  their  friendliness  and  in  their  power  to  bear  fruit 
in  future  offices  of  usefulness  and  good-will. 

Our  experience  has  sufficed  to  convince  us  that  we  wish 
to  govern  ourselves  with  a  common  language  and  under 
familiar  laws  and  customs,  upon  the  continent  of  North 
America.  The  responsibilities  of  greatness  and  power  will 


250    POLITICAL  PROBLEMS  OF  AMERICAN  DEVELOPMENT 

be  costly,  for  we  shall  have  to  maintain  a  powerful  navy, 
and  be  prepared  at  all  moments  to  do  our  share  toward 
keeping  the  world's  peace  and  order.  But  it  will  be  the 
business  of  our  statesmanship  to  remove  causes  of  disagree- 
ment in  every  direction,  and  to  seek  the  establishment  at 
home  and  abroad  of  high  standards  of  justice. 

There  has  never  been  so  wide-spread  harmony  in  matters 
political  throughout  the  United  States  as  in  these  years  of 
the  first  decade  of  the  twentieth  century.  There  are  many 
questions  of  disagreement,  but  the  margins  of  difference 
are  narrow,  the  demand  for  honesty  and  public  spirit  in  po- 
litical life  is  clear  and  strong,  and  one  party  might  succeed 
the  other  in  control  of  administration  without  shock  or 
strain,  certainly  without  violent  reversals  of  accustomed 
policy.  And  as  there  has  been  unusual  agreement  in  the 
field  of  domestic  political  life,  so  also  there  has  been  unprece- 
dented harmony  in  our  relationships  with  other  countries. 

We  have  never  been  on  terms  of  cordiality  more  sincere 
and  unfeigned  with  England,  France,  and  Germany,  than 
at  the  present  time.  Spain  begins  to  perceive  that  we 
rendered  her  an  inestimable  service  at  the  end  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  and  that  we  did  it  without  ill-will,  though  in 
a  rude  and  humiliating  manner.  The  ill-will  of  Colombia, 
on  account  of  our  virtual  seizure  of  Panama,  will  disappear 
with  the  realization  of  the  vast  benefits  that  Colombia, 
beyond  any  other  South  American  country,  is  to  receive 
from  a  canal  that  connects  her  frontages  on  two  oceans. 
Japanese  statesmanship  is  too  intelligent  to  misunderstand 
a  policy  that  deliberately  proposes  to  build  up  the  American 
states,  from  Maine  to  California,  upon  the  basis  of  a  citi- 
zenship of  unmixed  white  population,  with  economic  and 
political  standards  unmodified  by  Asiatic  immigration. 


PROBLEMS  OF  FOREIGN  POLICY  AND  EXPANSION      251 

The  time  is  evidently  one  favorable  for  progress  not  merely 
in  friendly  sentiment  among  nations,  but  also  for  substantial 
gains  in  methods  by  which  to  prevent  war  and  to  diminish 
the  chances  of  serious  dispute.  It  is  a  time  for  progress  in 
the  rules  and  agreements  which  make  up  the  so-called  law 
of  nations,  and  for  the  further  development  of  influence  and 
authority  in  world  conferences  and  tribunals  like  the  limited 
one  held  in  1906  for  our  hemisphere  at  Rio,  and  the  gen- 
eral ones  that  assemble  from  time  to  time  at  The  Hague.  If 
not  just  now,  then  in  the  comparatively  near  future  there 
should  appear  such  political  progress  in  the  domestic  life 
of  nations  and  in  their  relations  with  one  another,  as  to 
make  it  easily  possible  to  reduce  the  burden  of  armaments, 
to  get  rid  of  the  manifold  evils  of  militarism,  and  to  dis- 
tribute equitably  the  duties  of  international  police  work. 

But  it  must  be  a  good  while  yet  before  any  scheme  of 
international  organization  can  subordinate  to  itself  the  aims 
and  ambitions  of  developing  peoples  whose  patriotism  cen- 
ters in  their  allegiance  to  their  own  country.  And  as  their 
patriotism  grows  in  a  diffused  intelligence,  it  would  seem 
inevitable  that  their  political  life  should  take  on  our  own 
democratic  spirit,  if  not  our  precise  democratic  forms. 
Our  political  growth  and  experience  in  America  has 
demonstrated  the  wisdom  of  those  who  founded  our  in- 
stitutions; and  with  an  amazing  transformation  of  facili- 
ties and  social  conditions,  we  seem  not  to  have  changed 
the  essential  aims  of  our  political  structure,  which  are  those 
of  orderly  freedom,  of  equal  opportunity,  and  of  democratic 
brotherhood  upon  a  high  level  of  intelligence  and  social 
well-being. 


INDEX 


Adams,  J.  Q.,  Secretary  of  State,  226. 

Adirondack  forest  reserve,  110. 

Administrative  work,  Requirements 
of,  143. 

Agriculture,  Department  of,  Work  of, 
in  the  South,  83. 

Agriculture,  Western,  Building  up  of, 
100,  106. 

Aims,  Essential,  of  our  political 
structure,  251. 

Alaska,  Purchase  of,  230,  231; 
boundary  dispute  settled,  232. 

Algeciras,  Conference  at,  20. 

Alleghanies,  Growth  of  the  nation 
beyond  the,  27. 

America  no  field  for  European  colo- 
nial adventure,  226. 

American  boy,  Pioneer  training  of 
the,  42. 

American  colonies,  Homogeneous 
citizenship  of  the,  19,  34;  high 
diffusion  of  intelligence  in  the,  34. 

American  Colonization  Society,  Fu- 
tile efforts  of  the,  49. 

American  Forestry  Association,  110. 

American  life,  Nature  and  meaning  of 
politics  in,  1-29 ;  standards  of, 
higher  than  those  of  immigrants, 
70. 

American  national  life  exempt  from 
political  problems  of  Europe,  17. 

American  people,  Confidence  of,  in 
their  destiny,  34-35,  127;  trans- 
formation of  the,  74. 

American  personality,  Impress  of  the 
Indian  upon,  41,  44. 

American  republic,  Beginnings  of, 
21. 

Americans  a  composite  European 
race,  73-74. 

Anti-slavery  sentiment,  50-52. 


Argentine  Republic  and  the  Monroe 
Doctrine,  244. 

Arid  lands,  101 ;  given  to  Western 
states,  103 ;  productive  under  irri- 
gation, 103 ;  are  now  leased,  108. 

Arid  states,  Importance  of  develop- 
ment of,  106-107. 

Aristocracy,  A  social,  in  both  North- 
ern and  Southern  colonies,  45-46 ; 
accentuated  in  South  by  slavery, 
48,  84. 

Army,  Regular,  reduced  to  a  skele- 
ton, 142. 

Articles  of  Confederation,  The,  22. 

Assessments  and  taxes  for  political 
purposes,  138-139,  141-142. 

Assimilation,  Forces  of  attrition  and, 
great  in  New  York,  73;  unprece- 
dented task  of,  74 ;  requires  special 
social  and  public  movements,  75- 
76 ;  to  make  a  homogeneous  popu- 
lation, 116-117. 

Asylum,  Doctrine  of  free,  main- 
tained, 59,  62;  will  be  continued, 
116-117. 

Atlantic  and  Pacific  Railroad,  Land 
grants  to,  95. 

Australia,  Economic  tendencies  in, 
10. 

Austria-Hungary,  The  dual  monar- 
chy of,  9. 

Austro-Hungarian  immigrants,   58. 

Bagehot  an  evolutionary  thinker,  4. 

Balance  of  power  between  state 
and  individualism  not  changing, 
10-11. 

Ballot  paper,  Official,  prevents  bri- 
bery, 150. 

Banking  and  insurance  regulated  by 
government,  223. 


253 


254 


INDEX 


Banking  law  of  1863,  211-212. 

Black  Belt,  Concentration  in,  85. 

Blaine  and  Cleveland  campaign  of 
1884  decided  by  ballot-box  frauds, 
159. 

Bland-Allison  Compromise  Act  of 
1878,  217. 

Bonded  indebtedness,  Questions  of, 
submitted  to  popular  vote,  152- 
153. 

Bolt,  The,  a  party  corrective,  140- 
141. 

Boss,  The  party,  146;  and  corpora- 
tion money,  148-149 ;  revolt 
against,  in  many  states,  161. 

Boss  systems,  Worst  evils  of,  in- 
trenched in  great  cities,  156 ; 
known  and  exposed,  156. 

Brazil  and  the  Monroe  Doctrine, 
244. 

British  Islands,  Immigration  from 
the,  54. 

British  North  America  offered  to  us 
at  end  of  Civil  War,  231-233 ;  our 
failure  to  accept,  232,  242. 

Bryan,  William  J.,  and  his  policy,  183, 
192. 

Bulwer-Clayton  Treaty,  The,  241. 

Calhoun  and  Webster,  Flawless  logic 
of  each,  25 ;  national  leaders,  227. 

California  Spanish  territory,  31 ; 
held  by  Mexico,  33;  acquisition 
and  admission  of,  90-91 ;  pur- 
chased for  freedom,  228. 

Canada,  Reciprocity  with,  unwisely 
discontinued,  202 ;  constructive 
economic  development  in,  203,206 ; 
favored  the  Northern  cause,  229; 
ready  for  annexation,  231 ;  an- 
nexation of,  within  our  grasp, 
231,  233;  advantages  of  close  re- 
lation with,  233 ;  should  be  made 
our  best  friend,  235 ;  our  feeling 
toward,  246;  relations  of,  with 
the  old  world,  246-247 ;  has  four 
possible  futures,  247-248;  from 
the  standpoint  of  our  policy,  248. 

Canada's  Indian  problem,  43. 

Canadian  Indians  and  the  French 
trappers,  43. 


Canadian  Northwest  developed  by 
Americans,  234. 

Canadians  alienated,  233. 

Canals  and  railroads  projected  on 
paper,  93. 

Capital  and  labor,  18;  Government 
mediates  between,  122. 

Capital  drawn  from  the  East  and 
from  Europe,  96-98;  European, 
invested  in  American  manufactur- 
ing, 198 ;  private,  not  adequate  to 
large  undertakings,  168-169. 

Carolinas,  Settlers  from  the,  in 
Ohio,  Indiana,  and  Illinois,  38; 
in  Tennessee,  Alabama,  Missouri, 
and  Arkansas,  54. 

Cattle  and  hog  trust,  175. 

Cattle  companies,  Fraudulent  de- 
vices of,  103 ;  lands  held  by,  will 
be  leased,  108. 

Cattle  ranching  on  limited  pasturage 
a  failure,  102. 

Caucuses  and  conventions  under 
boss  control,  148. 

Central  and  South  American  dis- 
putes with  European  powers,  Our 
attitude  and  action  toward,  235- 
236. 

Central  Pacific  Railroad  subsidy,  94. 

Children,  State  must  regulate  indus- 
trial employment  of,  75;  efficient 
training  of,  for  citizenship,  69,  72, 
123,  154. 

Chili  and  the  Monroe  Doctrine, 
244. 

China,  The  "open  door"  in,  and  our 
influence,  240 ;  Boxer  uprising  in, 
and  our  part  in  its  suppression, 
240;  our  relations  with,  249. 

Chinese  exclusion  act,  Importance  of 
the,  64 ;  labor  on  the  Pacific  coast, 
62-64 ;  laborers,  Admission  of,  sus- 
pended, 63. 

Choctaws  removed  to  Indian  Ter- 
ritory, 43. 

Church  and  state,  Conflicting  claims 
of,  8. 

Citizen,  The,  and  the  community,  8, 
20;  and  his  part  in  politics,  116- 
144. 

Citizens  make  the  state,  126. 


INDEX 


255 


Citizenship,  American,  made  national 
by  the  14th  and  15th  Amend- 
ments, 78. 

Citizenship,  American,  solidarity  of, 
to  be  maintained,  61,  116-117, 
122. 

Citizenship  and  government,  Rela- 
tions of,  30. 

Citizenship  and  population,  Con- 
structive problems  of,  30-61. 

Citizenship  and  the  state,  15-16. 

Citizenship,  Equality  of,  21 ;  fitness 
of,  24 ;  government  the  chief  con- 
cern of,  30 ;  molding  children  for, 
72 ;  a  national  universal,  will 
stand,  81 ;  concern  of  government 
to  shape  its,  aright,  121 ;  what  it 
has  done  for  the  citizen  body,  122- 
126. 

Citizenship,  Homogeneous,  in  the 
colonies,  19  ;  development  of,  34  ; 
national  policy  for,  36 ;  intention 
of  Congress  to  create,  40;  prob- 
lems of,  46,  49,  185. 

Citizenship,  Our,  and  our  govern- 
ment, their  respective  special  aims, 
248;  training  and  intelligence  of, 
99-100. 

Civil  Service  Reform  movement,  The, 
142-144,  160. 

Civil  War,  The,  225;  Crucial  ques- 
tions, domestic  and  foreign,  led  to, 
228. 

Clay  and  Webster  favored  time  and 
compromises  in  political  contro- 
versy, 25 ;  national  leaders,  227. 

Coal  trust,  174-175. 

Collectivism  and  private  enterprise, 
167-169,  180. 

Colombia,  Republic  of,  Mercenary 
policy  of,  243 ;  our  policy  toward, 
244;  ill-will  of,  will  disappear, 
250. 

Colonies,  The  thirteen,  and  their 
federal  compact,  26. 

Colonization,  Period  and  sources  of, 
30-32,  58. 

Colonization  company,  American, 
49. 

Combination  in  business,  Normal 
development  of,  cannot  be  checked, 


189;  stringent  checks  proposed, 
190. 

Combinations  in  restraint  of  trade 
forbidden,  183. 

Commerce  between  the  states,  Power 
to  regulate  called  into  use,  170-171. 

Commerce,  domestic,  95  per  cent  of 
our  total  trade,  204. 

Commerce,  Our,  nationalized  by  free 
trade  between  all  the  states,  195. 

Commercial  congresses,  Trans-Mis- 
sissippi, 104. 

Common  carriers,  Changed  relations 
of,  186-188. 

Common  law,  Principles  of,  revived, 
186. 

Communities,  The  new,  eager  for 
population  and  development,  88; 
drew  capital  from  the  East  and 
from  Europe,  96;  high  intelli- 
gence of,  100-101. 

Competition  and  non-competitive 
economic  life,  183. 

Confederate  cruisers  equipped  by 
British  aid,  229;  lawsuit  for 
damages  from,  230. 

Conservatism  and  radicalism,  10,  12. 

Conservatives  and  liberals,  Differ- 
ences between,  a  question  of  dates, 
23. 

Constitution  of  1787,  The,  22. 

Constitution,  The,  provides  for  ad- 
mission but  not  for  withdrawal 
or  expulsion  of  a  state,  28. 

Constitutional  amendments  of  a 
statutory  character,  152-153. 

Constitutional  history,  Our,  not 
analogous  to  that  of  England  or 
European  countries,  22. 

Constitutions,  Final  value  of  written 
federal,  26-27;  state,  152. 

Continental  notes,  210. 

Continental  people,  Process  of  creat- 
ing a,  36-37. 

Corporations  and  legislation,  147— 
149 ;  and  politics,  165 ;  victims 
of  their  own  system,  165;  com- 
plaints against,  168;  great,  doing 
interstate  business  should  be  super- 
vised, 183 ;  organized  for  self- 
protection,  186. 


256 


INDEX 


Cotton  gin,  Invention  of,  strength- 
ened slave  system,  25;  revolu- 
tionized agriculture  and  commerce 
in  the  South,  197. 

Cotton  growing,  Expansion  of,  in  the 
South,  197,  228. 

County  system,  The  Southern,  35; 
the  Western,  36. 

Credit  Mobilier  scandal,  234. 

Creeks  removed  to  Indian  Territory, 
43. 

Criminal  recruits  from  American- 
born  children  of  immigrants,  69. 

Cuba,  Our  relations  to,  and  world 
politics,  20;  our  tariff  relations 
with,  202;  revolutions  in,  and 
revolt  against  Spain,  236;  our 
intervention  in,  and  its  results, 
237-238,  242. 

Cuban  policy,  Our,  approved  by  pub- 
lic opinion,  245. 

Currency  reform  questions  to  be 
dealt  with,  221-222. 

Dakotas,  Rapid  settlement  of,  100; 
disaster  in,  through  drought,  101. 

Declaration  of  Independence,  22. 

Defensive  forces  an  economic  in- 
surance, 208. 

Democracy,  American,  no  change 
in  spirit  or  purpose  of,  114, 
118. 

Democracy,  Development  of  social, 
hampered  in  the  South  by  slavery, 
48-49. 

Democratic  experiment,  The  one 
great,  of  the  modern  world,  34. 

Democratic  government,  Faith  in, 
for  ourselves  and  for  other  na- 
tions, 245. 

Democratic  idealism  for  free  trade, 
Basis  of,  200,  203. 

Democratic  ideals,  Modern,  and  the 
state,  9-10,  19. 

Democratic  institutions,  Transform- 
ing power  of,  60-61;  116-117; 
based  upon  high  intelligence, 
capacity,  and  well-being,  the  aim  of 
government,  209. 

Democratic  life,  Great  vigor  of,  in  the 
larger  cities,  156. 


Democratic  life  and  expression,  Long 
fight  for  freedom  of,  165. 

Democratic  party,  The,  133-136; 
captured  by  leaders  of  the  slave 
power,  133-134;  has  entire  field 
in  Southern  states,  136. 

Democratic  spirit,  Political  life  of 
developing  peoples  taking  on,  251. 

Democrats  congenial  to  Irish  immi- 
grants, 133;  in  1896  changed 
national  issue  from  tariff  to  money 
question,  204;  in  1900  to  imperi- 
alism, 204;  could  make  no  tariff 
change  when  in  power  under 
Cleveland,  205 ;  and  our  island 
dependencies,  245-246. 

Desert  land  law  abused,  108. 

Development,  National,  after  the 
Civil  War,  198;  the  mission  of 
American  politics,  201. 

Development,  Natural,  should  be 
allowed  without  arbitrary  re- 
straints, 188. 

Differences,  Imaginary,  produce  real, 
50;  between  the  East  and  the 
middle  West  disappeared,  118- 
119. 

Dingley  high  tariff  of  1897,  203-204 ; 
Democrats  will  undoubtedly  re- 
vise if  successful  in  1908,  205. 

Discrimination  in  railroad  rates  for- 
bidden, 171 ;  trusts  created  by,  175- 
176;  endeavors  to  abolish,  181. 

Domain,  Extension  of,  an  element 
of  national  growth,  33-34 ;  settle- 
ment and  use  of  the  national,  87— 
115;  to  be  distributed  to  actual 
settlers,  89-90. 

Economic  enterprises,  Absorption  of, 
167. 

Economic  forces,  Regulation  of,  the 
American  policy,  167,  170. 

Economic  freedom  and  personal 
initiative  maintained,  11,  166-167, 
189,  223. 

Economic  life  of  the  people  recog- 
nized, 10-11;  not  the  task  of 
government  to  assume  the  func- 
tions of  the,  166 ;  become  more 
complex,  166-167. 


INDEX 


257 


Economic  mobility,  60-61,  72-73. 

Economic  problems,  Transitional, 
following  emancipation,  117. 

Economic  questions,  Result  of  polit- 
ical controversy  over,  223. 

Economic  regulation,  Problems  of, 
166-193. 

Economic  resources,  Failure  to  pre- 
vent diversion  of,  into  the  hands 
of  a  few,  185. 

Economic  system,  new  logic  of,   18. 

Economic  systems,  Antagonism  of, 
ended  by  abolition  of  slavery,  117. 

Economic  world  establishes  its  own 
laws,  222. 

Education,  elementary,  Claims  of 
church  and  state  over,  8. 

Education  the  foremost  task  of  en- 
lightened statesmanship,  74.  See 
also  Public  schools  and  Schools. 

Elections,  State,  held  in  off  years,  161. 

England,  Political  opportunity  for 
ordinary  citizen  in,  128 ;  second 
war  with,  225 ;  effects  of,  226-227 ; 
offered  us  its  great  territories  of 
the  Northwest,  230,  233;  favored 
annexation  of  Canada,  231 ;  our 
relations  with,  250. 

England's  sympathy  for  the  South, 
229. 

English  colonization,  Extent  and 
quality  of,  30-31,  33,  224. 

English  language,  The,  our  great 
necessary  bond,  66. 

English  political  life,  Whole  spirit  of, 
aristocratic,  128. 

English-speaking  population,  An, 
30. 

Enterprises  of  national  moment  too 
great  for  private  capital,  168. 

Equality  of  opportunity  and  social 
mobility,  45-46,  122. 

Equality  of  rights  and  opportunities 
a  dominant  doctrine,  5,  166-167, 
189,  223. 

Eras  of  good  feeling,  120-121. 

Erie  Canal,  The,  93. 

Europe  nationalistic  and  protective, 
206. 

European  colonial  adventure,  Amer- 
ica no  field  for,  226. 


European  nations,  national  life  of, 
17. 

European  sovereignties,  Instability 
of,  in  the  Napoleonic  epoch,  26. 

European  states,  Difficulties  of  mod- 
ernizing relationships  in,  17  ;  long 
fight  for  manhood  suffrage  in,  18. 

Exchange,  Freedom  of,  must  be 
maintained,  189. 

Exports,  Prohibition  of  taxes  on,  195. 

Families,  Migration  westward  of 
interrelated,  37. 

Farming  system,  Free,  of  the  old 
Northwest,  90. 

Federal  compact,  The,  became  a  mere 
legal  theory,  27. 

Federal  union,  Continuance  of,  an 
object  of  concern,  24. 

Federalists,  The,  133. 

Federation,  limited,  Tendency  of 
experience  toward,  21. 

Federative  balance  between  central 
government  and  local  authorities 
maintained,  12. 

Fenianism  encouraged,  233. 

Finance,  Wide  knowledge  of  prob- 
lems of,  99. 

Financial  administration,  Training 
in,  afforded  by  municipal,  town- 
ship and  county  offices,  130. 

Fishing  rights,  The  Northeast  and 
our,  227  ;  England  willing  to  settle 
claims  for,  231. 

Flag,  Our,  the  emblem  of  an  un- 
questioned sovereignty,  22. 

Florida  owned  by  Spain,  31,  224; 
purchased,  227. 

Food  products,  World-wide  effect  of 
cheapening,  97. 

Foreign  policy,  Problems  of,  224-251. 

Foreign  questions,  Opportunity  to 
settle  all,  rejected  by  our  politi- 
cians, 233. 

Foreigners,  Americanizing,  58-59,  61, 
70,  116-117. 

Forest  areas,  Destruction  of,  in 
building  up  prairie  states,  109 ;  held 
by  lumber  kings,  112. 

Forest  reserves,  Creation  of,  105, 
108-109,  111-112,  118. 


258 


INDEX 


Forestry  Association,  American, 
110. 

Forestry  policy,  National,  adopted, 
110,  118. 

Fortunes,  personal,  Undue  extent  of, 
184 ;  acquisition  of  large,  must  not 
be  at  expense  of  moderate,  185. 

France,  Territorial  possessions  of,  31, 
224 ;  as  a  nationality,  249 ;  our 
relations  with,  cordial,  250. 

Franchise,  Extension  of  the,  in  Eng- 
land and  in  Europe,  9  ;  restricting 
the,  in  case  of  the  foreign-born, 
65-66;  problems  of  the,  116-134. 

Free  homestead  legislation,  91-92. 

Free  silver  swept  Republicans  of  the 
far  West  to  William  Bryan,  136. 

Free  Soil  party,  The,  133. 

Free  trade  between  all  the  states,  195. 

Free  trade  tariff  of  1846,  reduced  in 
1857,  196. 

Freeman,  Edward  A.,  Historico- 
political  notions  of,  4. 

French  and  Indian  War,  31-32. 

French  colonization,  Extent  of,  30— 
32,  224. 

French  Revolution,  Effect  of,  on 
Americans,  224-225. 

Game  of  politics,  The,  16,  127,  131. 

Gas  and  electric  lighting  services 
monopolistic  and  also  public,  188. 

Geneva  arbitration  and  its  loss  to 
us,  232. 

Georgia  cedes  Mississippi  Territory 
to  the  Union,  39 ;  settlers  from, 
flocking  across  the  mountains,  54. 

German-Americans,  Younger,  losing 
acquaintance  with  German  lan- 
guage, 68 ;  a  fading  distinction,  69. 

German  and  Irish  stock  engaged  in 
Americanizing  foreigners,  68—69. 

German  immigrants  to  Pennsyl- 
vania, 54 ;  to  the  West,  55-56,  68, 
91 ;  drawn  to  the  Republicans,  133 ; 
driven  to  the  Democrats  by  Pro- 
hibition movement,  135. 

German  industrial  progress  has  re- 
duced emigration,  57. 

Germanic  confederations  and  em- 
pires, Variety  of,  26. 


Germany,  Sweeping  away  of  feudal 
privileges  in,  10. 

Germany,  United,  as  a  nationality, 
249 ;  our  relations  with,  most  cor- 
dial, 250. 

Gold  and  silver,  Ratio  of,  214. 

Gold,  Discovery  of,  in  California,  90, 
92 ;  increased  production  of,  set- 
tled the  money  question,  136 ; 
enormous  recent  production  of, 
220,  221 ;  answers  business  world 
for  a  standard,  222. 

Gold  reserve,  The,  threatened  by 
the  "endless  chain,"  219. 

Gold  standard,  The,  drew  Eastern 
Democrats  to  the  Republicans, 
135-136. 

Governing  power,  Distribution  of, 
7-8. 

Government,  expense  of,  Great,  208. 

Government  in  America,  The  pur- 
poses of,  142. 

Government  ownership,  Conceivable 
advantages  of,  182. 

Government,  Unquestioned  suprem- 
acy of,  to  be  maintained,  166 ; 
extending  the  business  activities 
of  the,  167-169. 

Grain  elevator  monopoly,  175. 

Granger  movement,  The,  178-179. 

Grazing  belt,  Conditions  in  the,  102- 
103,  108-109. 

Grazing  lands,  Methods  of  leasing, 
112,  114,  118. 

Greeley,  Horace,  and  the  New  York 
Weekly  Tribune,  163. 

Greenback  movement,  The,  135. 

Greenbackers,  Doctrine  of  the,  213, 
216. 

Greenbacks,  Issue  of,  212;  struggle 
over  their  proper  place  in  our 
currency  system,  213 ;  inflation 
of,  vetoed  by  President  Grant,  215  ; 
retirement  of,  stopped,  216. 

Gulf  of  Mexico  belonged  to  Spain,  31. 

Hague  Conference,  The  first,  20. 
Hague  Tribunal,  The,  20. 
Haiti,  Our  policy  toward,  243-244. 
Hamilton,  Alexander,  on  a  tariff  to 
encourage  industries,  195. 


INDEX 


259 


Harper's  Weekly  under  editorship  of 

George  William  Curtis,  163. 
Hawaiian    Islands    included    in    our 

economic  zone,  202. 
Hay-Pauncefote  Treaty,  The,  242. 
Hayes  and  Tilden  election,  The,  158- 

159. 

Holy  Alliance,  The,  226. 
Homestead  principle  applied  to  land 

grants  to  railroads,  95. 
Homesteads     located     fraudulently, 

108. 
House  of  Commons,  Few  men  hope 

to  enter,  128. 

Illinois,  Blending  of  settlers  in,  38; 
conditions  for  settlement  of,  pre- 
scribed in  Ordinance  of  1787,  38- 
39;  growth  of,  53;  free  farming 
in,  90. 

Illiteracy  among  poorer  whites  of  the 
South,  77;  negro  illiteracy  dimin- 
ishing, 82. 

Immigrants,  European,  not  willing 
to  go  to  slave  states,  55;  propa- 
ganda conducted  by,  57 ;  better 
distribution  of,  required,  66. 

Immigration,  54-61,  71 ;  character 
of  original,  54;  British  and  Ger- 
man, 54,  91;  Irish,  55-56,  91; 
other  nationalities,  57-58 ;  as- 
similation of,  58-59,  61,  68-69; 
restrictions  to,  60,  71-72;  Euro- 
pean, Question  of  checking,  65—66, 
117;  better  inspecting  and  sifting 
of,  66 ;  statistics  of,  55,  56,  57,  58, 
59,  71;  tests  of  education  and 
property,  72. 

Imperialism,  Political  contest  over,  a 
wholesome  one,  238. 

Imports,  National  government  alone 
levies  taxes  on,  195. 

Income  tax  advocated,  209. 

Indian  characteristics  impressed  upon 
American  personality,  41-42,  44. 

Indian  families  and  individuals, 
Distribution  of  lands  in  several ty 
to,  44. 

Indian  lands,  Aquirement  of,  88 ; 
opened  up  to  white  settlers,  43- 
44. 


Indian  question,  Difficulties  of  the, 
41-45;  gradually  overcome,  68. 

Indian  Territory,  Creation  of,  43. 

Indiana,  Blending  of  settlers  in,  38; 
conditions  for  settlement  of,  pre- 
scribed in  Ordinance  of  1787,  38- 
39;  growth  of,  53;  free  farming 
in,  90. 

Indians,  French  missionaries  to, 
superb  pioneers,  32;  good  faith 
pledged  to  the,  in  Ordinance  of 
1787,  40;  admitted  to  citizenship 
in  Mexico,  42;  will  enter  into  full 
American  citizenship,  44;  race 
absorption  will  dispose  of,  45. 

Individual  liberties  enhanced  by 
governmental  authority,  11,  166- 
167. 

Individual  liberty  a  dominant  doc- 
trine, 5,  19,  166-167,  223. 

Individualism,  Growth  of  the  abstract 
doctrine  of,  5. 

Industrial  monopoly,  Checking  of, 
176,  190. 

Industrial  movement,  The  modern, 
and  the  new  political  activity,  18. 

Initiative  and  referendum,  152. 

Intelligence,  Diffusion  of,  in  Ameri- 
can revolutionary  period,  34. 

Interests  hostile  to  the  railroads, 
178-179. 

Internal  revenue  tax,  209. 

International  law,  A  time  for  prog- 
ress in,  251. 

Interstate  Commerce  Commission 
created,  171 ;  power  of,  increased, 
181,  189. 

Interstate  Commerce  Law  of  1887 
passed,  171,  176. 

Ireland,  Government  of,  a  perplex- 
ing question  to  British  states- 
men, 8. 

Irish- Americans,  Young,  ignorant  of 
Irish  politics  of  the  day,  68;  a 
fading  distinction,  69. 

Irish  and  German  stock  engaged  in 
Americanizing  foreigners,  68-69. 

Irish  immigration  after  Irish  famine, 
55-56,  68,  91. 

Iron-masters,  A  few,  specially  fa- 
vored by  railroads,  173-174. 


260 


INDEX 


Irrigation  conventions,  Trans-Mis- 
sissippi, 104. 

Irrigation,  Possibilities  of,  103,  107. 

Irrigation  rights,  Water  for,  will  be 
sold  by  the  government,  114. 

Irrigation  works,  Governmental,  105  ; 
cost  of,  107. 

Isolation,  Our,  a  factor  of  our  po- 
litical stability,  22. 

Isthmian  Canal,  An,  240-243  ;  French 
project  for,  across  Isthmus  of 
Panama,  241 ;  Americans  for 
Nicaragua  route,  241 ;  abandoned 
and  French  rights  at  Panama 
bought  by  United  States,  242-243  ; 
required,  242  ;  effect  of  completion 
of,  243;  will  benefit  all  nations, 
246. 

Italy,  Surplus  population  of,  has 
emigrated,  57. 

Italy,  United,  as  a  nationality,  249. 

Jackson,  Andrew,  hero  of  New  Or- 
leans, 227. 

Japan  promoting  economic  progress, 
206;  as  a  nationality,  249;  our 
mission  to,  249 ;  understands  our 
Asiatic  policy,  250. 

Japanese  government  utilizing  the 
migratory  energy  of  its  people, 
64. 

Japanese  immigration  checked,   64. 

Jefferson,  Thomas,  a  thinker  in 
generalities,  4,  226. 

John,  King,  Days  of,  repeated  in 
Russia,  9. 

Johnson,  Andrew,  Attempt  to  im- 
peach, 234. 

Kansas,  Destiny  of,  in  doubt,  90; 
rapid  settlement  of,  100. 

Kentucky  Resolutions,  Excellent  ar- 
guments for  and  against  the,  25. 

Know-nothingism,  56,  62. 

Korea,  Our  relations  with,  249. 

Labor,  foreign,  Utilization  of  all 
classes  of,  72-73. 

Labor,  Government  efforts  to  im- 
prove condition  of,  122. 

Labor-unions,    Federations  of,  186. 


Laborers,  European,  sold  in  open 
markets  in  Northern  ports,  80. 

Laborers,  Indentured,  in  Virginia,  46. 

Land  system,  Complete  revision  of, 
necessary,  108 ;  old-time,  reversed, 
109;  recent  policies,  118. 

Landlordism  and  collectivism  in 
management  of  public  domain,  114. 

Lands,  Public,  donated  for  school 
purposes,  76 ;  cost  to  the  govern- 
ment of  the,  87-88 ;  virtually  free 
to  settlers,  89 ;  price  per  acre,  89, 
92 ;  given  to  promote  transporta- 
tion enterprises,  92,  93 ;  South 
opposed  to  giving,  93. 

Lands,  The  new,  sold  to  small  far- 
mers, 35. 

Language,  The  bond  of,  8,  66. 

Languages,  Diverse,  a  disturbing 
element,  9. 

Latin-American  republics,  Our  re- 
lation to  the,  226. 

Lesseps,  M.  de,  and  the  Panama 
Canal  project,  241-242. 

Lewis  and  Clark  Expedition,  231. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  and  the  spread 
of  slavery,  50-51 ;  assassination 
of,  and  what  it  cost  us  in  states- 
manship, 229-230. 

Literacy,  The  test  of,  65. 

Lobbies  and  bribing,  147. 

Lords,  House  of,  must  disappear,  9. 

Louisiana  Purchase,  The,  27,  33,  53, 
90,  227,  231. 

Machine,  The  party,  and  its  manipu- 
lation, 147-149,  154;  power  of, 
breaking  down,  151 ;  means  of  de- 
feating, 153. 

Machine  politics,  Reaction  against, 
149-150;  worst  evils  of,  in  great 
cities,  156. 

Machinery  of  government,  Views 
of,  12 ;  smooth  running,  15 ;  chief 
concern  of  citizenship,  30. 

Machinery  of  politics,  official,  126. 

Machines,  political,  Venal  alliance 
of,  with  private  interests,  160. 

McKinley-Bryan  silver  fight,  220. 

McKinley  tariff  of  1890  and  reci- 
procity, 203. 


INDEX 


261 


Madison,  James,  available  for  con- 
sultation, 226. 

Magnate,  The  railroad,  177. 

Maine,  Sir  Henry,  Historico-political 
notions  of,  4. 

Man,  The,  more  important  than  the 
dollar,  186. 

Manhood  suffrage,  Long  fight  for,  in 
European  countries,  18-19. 

Manual  labor,  unskilled,  Supply  of, 
60. 

Manufacturers,  English,  dominated 
the  markets  of  the  world,  197. 

Manufacturing  growth,  Our  first, 
aided  by  a  tariff,  195-196. 

Massachusetts,  Exclusion  of  illiter- 
ates in,  represents  fastidiousness, 
125. 

Maximilian  and  Mexico,  229. 

Merchant  Marine,  Disappearance  of, 
explained,  206. 

Mexicanizing,  Danger  from,  158. 

Mexico,  England,  France,  and  Spain, 
united  to  intervene  in,  228 ;  Maxi- 
milian placed  in  power  by  Napo- 
leon III,  229. 

Mexico,  Spanish  influence  in,  31-32; 
Indian  racial  type  in,  42-43 ; 
racial  conditions  in,  44-45;  War 
with,  90,  225. 

Michigan,  Conditions  for  settlement 
of,  prescribed  in  Ordinance  of 
1787,  38-39. 

Middle  States,  Settlers  from  the,  in 
Ohio,  Indiana,  and  Illinois,  38,  54. 

Migrations,  European,  in  periods,  71. 

Migratory  spirit,  The,  in  this  coun- 
try, 57,  62. 

Mineral  lands,  Government  reserva- 
tion of,  112-113;  should  have 
been  retained,  114,  184;  recent 
policies  concerning,  118;  future 
development  of,  185. 

Mississippi,  English  jurisdiction  ex- 
tended to  the,  32  ;  and  beyond,  33. 

Mississippi  River,  New  communities 
west  of  the,  53,  91;  Territory 
drained  by  the,  property  of  Spain, 
31,  224. 

Mississippi  Territory  organized  under 
the  principles  of  the  Ordinance  of 


1787,  39 ;  Indians  in  the,  provided 
for,  43. 

Mississippi  Valley,  Rapid  settlement 
of  the,  after  the  war,  95. 

Missouri  should  have  been  a  free 
state,  38. 

Mobility,  social  and  political,  Preser- 
vation of,  45-46,  60-61;  118-119, 
122. 

Monetary  system  could  be  improved, 
221. 

Money  and  currency,  Problems  of, 
210-223;  as  popular  issues,  98- 
100;  194. 

Money  function  of  government,  222. 

Money  to  supply  government  needs, 
Method  of  raising,  208-209. 

Mongolian  influx,  A,  tolerable,  86. 

Monopolies  and  combinations  Mr. 
Bryan  would  destroy,  183,  192. 

Monopolies,  Government  regulation 
of,  confined  within  narrow  limits, 
188,  194. 

Monopoly  privileges,  Unprecedented, 
granted  by  railroads,  174-175; 
trusts  and  corporations  have  given 
up,  182. 

Monroe  Doctrine,  225-226;  a  con- 
crete lesson  in  the,  229 ;  expanded 
to  fit  the  Western  hemisphere,  235- 
236;  asserted,  244,  249. 

Morals,  Improvement  in  political 
and  business,  165. 

Morrill  tariff  of  1861,  largely  pro- 
tectionist, 196. 

Municipal  elections  held  at  a  sepa- 
rate time,  150,  160-161.  - 

Municipal  Voters'  League  of  Chicago 
and  its  work  for  Illinois,  155-156. 

Napoleonic  epoch,  Instability  of 
European  sovereignties  in  the,  26. 

Nation-building,  Conditions  to  be 
guarded  against  in,  118-119. 

National  Civil  Service  Reform  Asso- 
ciation, 143. 

National  expansion,  Acquisition  of 
territory  for,  the  object  of  states- 
manship, 231 ;  our  one  great  op- 
portunity for,  indefinitely  post- 
poned, 234. 


262 


INDEX 


National  progress,  Government  a 
positive  force  for,  142. 

National  unity  the  transcendent 
problem,  24-29,  116,  227,  249. 

Nationalism,  Present  arbitrary  and 
narrow  conception  of,  20;  ideals 
of,  249. 

Nationalism  and  sectionalism  growing 
side  by  side,  227. 

Nationalist  and  federalist,  Duty  of,  26. 

Nationality,  A  new  composite,  86; 
creating  a  great,  114. 

Nebraska,  Rapid  settlement  of,  100. 

Negro,  The,  accorded  ample  eco- 
nomic opportunities,  66-67;  sub- 
jected to  severe  competition  with 
white  labor,  67. 

Negro  illiterates,  Exclusion  of,  in  the 
South,  124-125. 

Negro  population,  Percentage  of, 
decreasing,  84-85. 

Negro  question,  The,  45-53;  Euro- 
pean immigration  the  ultimate 
solution  of  the,  67;  political 
problems  arising  from,  117. 

Negroes  and  slavery  elements  of 
political  controversy,  24,  40. 

Negroes,  Results  of  enfranchisement 
of,  77-78;  as  citizens  North  and 
South,  81-82;  schools  for,  82-83; 
disfranchisement  of  illiterates,  25 ; 
acquisition  of  the  franchise  by  the, 
abnormal,  125 ;  restoration  of,  will 
depend  on  their  merits,  126. 

New  England  conscience,  The,  51-52. 

New  England  protected  slave  trade 
and  plotted  secession,  24,  227; 
settlers  from,  in  Ohio,  Indiana,  and 
Illinois,  38,  54. 

New  England  town  meeting,  35. 

New  Orleans,  Battle  of,  227. 

New  York  City,  Fairly  honest  voting 
and  counting  in,  160. 

New  York  State  doubtful  in  presi- 
dential years,  157-158. 

New  Zealand,  Economic  tendencies 
in,  10. 

Newfoundland,  Our  fishing  rights  off 
coasts  of,  227. 

Newlands,  Senator,  of  Nevada,  and 
the  Reclamation  Act,  104. 


Newspapers,  country,  subsidized,  148. 

Newspapers  in  foreign  languages  un- 
read by  the  second  generation,  74. 

Nicaragua  ship  canal,  168.  See 
Isthmian  Canal. 

North  Carolina  cedes  territory  now 
Tennessee  to  the  Union,  39. 

Northern  Pacific  Railroad,  Land 
grants  to,  94-95. 

Northern  prejudice  played  upon,  134. 

Northern  statesmen  tolerated  con- 
tinuance of  slave  trade,  25. 

Northwest  boundary,  How  sectional 
animosities  affected  settlement  of 
the,  228. 

Northwestern  territory,  Cession  of 
the,  by  Virginia  and  other  colo- 
nies, 27. 

Office-holding  class,  We  must  have 
no  permanent,  141. 

Office,  rotation  in,  141. 

Office-seeking,  The  evils  of,  141. 

Officials,  Number  of  government,  127. 

Ohio,  Blending  of  settlers  in,  38; 
conditions  for  settlement  of,  pre- 
scribed in  Ordinance  of  1787,  38- 
39 ;  growth  of,  53 ;  free  farming 
in.  90. 

Oil,  coal,  and  mineral  privileges,  Leas- 
ing of  by  government,  112,  114; 
should  have  been  retained,  184. 

Oil-company,  One,  favored  by  rail- 
roads, 174. 

Oklahoma  admitted  as  a  state,  44. 

Opportunities  in  American  political 
life,  Stimulating  effect  of,  129-130; 
lacking  in  European  public  life, 
129. 

Ordinance  of  1787,  Some  provisions 
of  the,  38-40. 

Oregon,  Amending  constitution  in, 
153. 

Oregon  country,  Title  to,  confirmed, 
91 ;  dispute  over  the,  227 ;  settled 
by  diplomacy,  228;  Lewis  and 
Clark  Expedition  to  the,  231. 

Pacific  coast  country,  Isolation  of 
the,  92-93;  development  of,  Chi- 
nese labor  in,  62. 


INDEX 


263 


Panama,  Our  relation  to,  and  world 
politics,  20;  Republic  of,  estab- 
lished, 243 ;  our  virtual  seizure  of, 
250. 

Panama  Canal  and  a  revival  of 
American  merchant  shipping,  207. 

Panama  ship  canal,  168.  See  also 
Isthmian  Canal. 

Panic  of  1873,  215,  216. 

Panics  of  1837  and  1857,  93. 

Parity  on  a  gold  basis  now  easily 
maintained,  221. 

Parliamentary  training  afforded  by 
political  meetings,  129-130. 

Parties,  American  political,  The 
working  of,  126-144;  opportuni- 
ties in  non-official  organizations, 
130-131 ;  two  traditional  organiza- 
tions, 132 ;  Republican  and  Demo- 
cratic, 133-134;  Prohibition  and 
Greenback,  135;  the  two  domina- 
ting, institutional  and  organic,  136  ; 
keep  their  national  character,  137 ; 
organized  according  to  political 
divisions,  138 ;  stengthened  by  or- 
ganization, 139-140;  the  "bolt"  a 
party  corrective,  140;  office-hold- 
ing and  office-seeking  in,  141-142 ; 
the  boss  and  corporate  interests, 
145-151 ;  influence  of,  in  official 
affairs,  152;  corruption  in,  156- 
161;  purification  of,  161-164;  will 
continue  institutional,  165. 

Parties,  The  minor,  have  value  as 
protests  against  machine  politics, 
156-157. 

Party  divisions  in  local  elections, 
141. 

Party  machinery,  Further  problems 
of,  145. 

Party  newspaper,  The,  maintains  its 
freedom,  162. 

Party  opinion  expounded  by  presi- 
dential nominee,  137. 

Party  political  life  associated  with 
the  structure  of  government,  138. 

Party  solidarity,  141. 

Party  system,  The  growth  of  the, 
130-132;  must  be  truly  demo- 
cratic, 153;  subjection  to,  fol- 
lowed by  revolt,  155. 


Peace,  domestic,  a  safeguard  against 

foreign  war,   225 ;    never  stronger 

than  now,  250. 
Pensions,  A  vast  outlay  for,  equalizes 

conditions,  208. 
People's   welfare,    The,    the  concern 

of  the  state,  16,  166. 
Periodical    press,    the,    of    national 

circulation,  Power  of,  163. 
Philadelphia,    Correction    of    voting 

system   in,    154-155. 
Philippines,    Our    relations    to    the, 

and  world  politics,  20;    our  tariff 

relations  with  the,   202;    capture 

and  acquisition  of  the,   238-239; 

our  policy  toward,  239 ;  its  results, 

239-240. 

Platforms,  Party,  137. 
Political  agitation,  Periods  of,  15. 
Political  animals,  Americans,  131. 
Political    contributions,    Prohibition 

of,  by  private  corporations,  151. 
Political  controversy,  116,  119,  120. 
Political  controversy  over  economic 

questions,  Result  of,  223. 
Political  corruption,  157,  159,  189. 
Political  expenditure,    publicity  for, 

151. 

Political  issues  of  the  immediate  fu- 
ture, 192-193. 

Political  life  and  operation  of   gov- 
ernment, 149. 
Political    life,    Efforts    to    keep    our 

internal,  sane,  249. 
Political     machinery,     official      and 

voluntary,      126-128 ;       popularly 

worked,  unknown  in  England,  129 ; 

management  of,  a  business,   138- 

139. 
Political     organization,     Voluntary, 

apart  from  political  parties,   143. 
Political  power,  Absolutism  of,  6. 
Political  power  and  energy,  Notions 

of,  how  arrived  at,  4—6. 
Political  units,  Training  had  in  our 

smaller,  127-128. 
Politicians,  Professional,  for  personal 

gain,  139,  165. 
Politics,  honest  and  public-spirited, 

Power  of,  151. 
Politics,     Philosophical     study     of, 


264 


INDEX 


necessary,  3 ;  a  great  national 
game,  16,  127,  131 ;  the  voluntary 
organization  of,  always  in  contact 
with  the  official  business  of  gov- 
ernment, 137;  business  of,  ab- 
sorbed by  professional  politicians, 
160;  divisive  and  sectional  char- 
acter of  our,  225,  227 ;  dominant, 
at  Washington,  after  Lincoln's 
death,  234. 

"Pooling  "  of  railroad  rates,  171. 

Population  and  citizenship,  Construc- 
tive problems  of,  30-61. 

Population,  Problems  of,  7 ;  divi- 
sion of,  55 ;  massing  in  cities,  65. 

Populistic  movement,  The,  135. 

Porto  Rico  included  in  our  economic 
zone,  202;  our  policy  toward, 
239-240. 

Post  Office  Department,  Work  of,  in 
delivering  periodicals,  163-164;  a 
landmark  in  development  of  free 
democratic  political  life,  164. 

Prairie  states,  Destruction  of  forests 
in  upbuilding  the,  109-110. 

Presidential  campaign  our  "quad- 
rennial political  cycle,"  126. 

Presidential  election,  might  be 
changed  by  a  single  ballot-box, 
258. 

Press,  The,  serves  public  as  against 
private  ends,  162 ;  foremost  agency 
in  unifying  American  life,  164. 

Primary  election  system,  150,  161. 

Private  contracts  enforced  by  gov- 
ernment, 222. 

Prohibition  wave,  The,  and  third 
party,  135,  201. 

Protection  and  free  trade  contro- 
versy, Doctrinaire  aspects  of, 
passed  away,  202. 

Protective  tariff  blended  with  all 
policies  for  high  development,  198. 

Protestant  Reformation,  Modern  po- 
litical movement  in  the,  18. 

Public  opinion,  how  built  up,  124 ; 
an  aroused,  151 ;  developed,  162. 

Public  policies,  Question  of  right 
and  wrong  in,  23. 

Public  policy,  Views  of,  formulated 
by  the  great  parties,  137;  failures 


of,  in  certain  lines,  184-185;  new 
lines  evolved,  190-191. 

Public  schools,  our  essential  institu- 
tion, 61 ;  burden  of  immigration 
upon  our,  66;  greatly  increased 
responsibility  resting  upon  our,  70 ; 
must  be  of  the  best,  74-75. 

Public  schools  and  citizenship,  46. 

Public  schools  of  New  York  and 
Chicago  focuses  of  patriotic  Ameri- 
can enthusiasm,  73. 

Quarter-section  homesteads,  89,  92. 

Quebec,  Battle  of,  32. 

Quebec,  French  in  the  province  of,  32. 

Questions  of  current  politics,  Treat- 
ment of,  2. 

Questions  of  public  concern,  More, 
should  'be  submitted  to  popular 
vote,  153 ;  being  solved,  164. 

Race  problems,  Indians  and  negroes, 
40-53. 

Race  question  in  the  South,  Prob- 
lems arising  from  the,  117. 

Race  situation,  Social  difficulties  of 
the  Southern,  81-83. 

Racial  and  economic  antagonisms 
to  be  guarded  against,  118. 

Railroad  control  by  government,  176, 
178;  must  be  beneficial,  181. 

Railroad  interests  powerful  in  po- 
litical life,  179. 

Railroad  lines  in  private  hands,  169. 

Railroad  officials,  blunted  moral  per- 
ception of,  172-173. 

Railroad  rates,  Power  to  regulate, 
not  abused,  170;  discrimination  in, 
forbidden,  171 ;  rebates  and  eva- 
sions, 172-175. 

Railroad  regulation,  National,  se- 
cured, 171-172. 

Railroad  systems,  Attempt  to  break 
up  large,  177. 

Railroad  transportation,  Certain 
forms  of  agreement  desirable  in, 
189. 

Railroads,  Canals  and,  projected 
on  paper,  92-93 ;  became  colo- 
nizers and  immigration  agents  on 
a  great  scale,  95 ;  a  necessity,  96 ; 


INDEX 


265 


reasons  for  government  ownership 
of,  in  European  countries,  167- 
168 ;  arguments  for,  in  this 
country,  168 ;  insatiate  demand 
for,  169  ;  eager  for  business,  169 ; 
war  against  special  rates,  169- 
t  170;  government's  right  to  fix 
rates  upheld,  170;  as  common 
carriers,  170  ;  create  a  "community 
of  interest,"  177;  interests  hostile 
to,  178-179 ;  function  of  govern- 
ment in  relation  to,  178;  acquisi- 
tion, laissez  faire,  or  supervision, 
180-181 ;  public  regulation  of, 
difficult,  181 ;  national  charters 
to  interstate,  and  national  con- 
trol of  stock  and  bond  issues,  181  ; 
making  rates,  188-189 ;  govern- 
ment operation  of,  proposed,  190 ; 
government  regulation  of,  confined 
within  narrow  limits,  188,  194 ; 
advocated  by  William  J.  Bryan, 
192  ;  result  of,  193. 

Railroads,  transcontinental,  Public 
credit  and  lands  granted  to,  94-95, 
168. 

Railways  and  trusts,  control  of,  166- 
193. 

Rainfall,  areas  of  doubtful,  Farming 
in,  102. 

Rate-cutting,  171. 

Rates,  The  making  of,  188-189. 

Rates,  see  Railroad  rates. 

Rebates  and  discriminations,  172- 
175. 

Rebates  and  evasions,  172-175 ;  en- 
deavor to  abolish,  181. 

Reclamation  Act  of  1902,  104-106. 

Reclamation  Fund,  106,  107. 

Reclamation  service,  185. 

Reclamation  under  Geological  Sur- 
vey, 107,  185. 

Reconstruction  on  a  false  basis,  234. 

Reconstruction  period,  Dangerous 
tension  through  the,  117-118. 

Referendum,  The,  152. 

Reform,  Political,  movements,  161- 
162. 

Reformers  in  politics  must  succeed, 
154;  have  made  enormous  prog- 
ress, 160. 


Reforms,  Great,  effected  through 
ripening  of  conditions,  182. 

Renaissance,  Modern  political  move- 
ment in  the,  18. 

Representation,  Southern,  no  re- 
duction of,  likely,  82. 

Republican  party,  The,  133-136; 
identified  with  the  cause  of  the 
Union,  134;  enfranchised  the 
slaves,  134. 

Revolutionary  soldiers,  Land  grants 
to,  taken  up,  53. 

Revolutionary  War,  The,  22. 

Revolutionary  War  debts  of  the 
colonies  assumed  by  the  govern- 
ment, 87. 

Rhode  Island,  Reform  of  represen- 
tation in,  almost  impossible,  17. 

River  and  harbor  improvements 
profitable  to  commerce,  208. 

Roosevelt,  President,  on  the  rec- 
lamation of  the  arid  lands,  104- 
105;  nomination  of,  drew  back 
Western  Republicans,  136 ;  recent 
messages  of,  189 ;  requirements 
of  his  policy,  190-191 ;  reelection 
of,  in  1904,  the  greatest  personal 
triumph  in  history  of  American 
politics,  204. 

Rousseau  a  thinker  in  generalities,  4. 

Russia  and  constitutional  liberties, 
23 ;  immigrants  from,  58 ;  like 
England  in  the  days  of  King  John, 
9 ;  diplomatic  dispute  with,  227 ; 
as  a  nationality,  249. 

St.  Lawrence  River,  Territory  con- 
tiguous to,  the  property  of  France, 
31 ;  the  Northeast  concerned 
about,  227. 

St.  Patrick's  Day  in  America,  68. 

San  Domingo,  Our  relations  to,  and 
world  politics,  20;  our  policy 
toward,  243-244;  treaty  with, 
ratified,  244. 

Scandinavians  in  the  Northwest,  57 ; 
becoming  fully  American,  69; 
became  Republicans,  133. 

Schools,  Lands  designated  for  sup- 
port of,  35;  encouraged  by  Or- 
dinance pf  1787,  38;  must  per- 


266 


INDEX 


petuate  American  ideals  and  tra- 
ditions, 75-76 ;  dearth  of  common, 
in  the  South,  76-77. 

Scotch-Irish  immigrants  to  the  Mid- 
dle States,  54. 

Secessionist  movement,  The  first,  at 
Hartford  Convention,  227. 

Sectional  and  race  questions  inten- 
sified by  party  management,  77-78, 
134-135. 

Sectional  animosities,  Accumulation 
of,  228  ;  after  the  war,  230 ;  their 
cost  to  us,  232-233;  effaced  by 
war  with  Spain,  242. 

Sectional  feeling,  Vast  change  in, 
119. 

Sectionalism  and  nationalism,  227, 
228,  232. 

Seminoles  removed  to  Indian  Ter- 
ritory, 43. 

Senate,  United  States,  Undue  in- 
fluence of  cow-boy  states  in  the, 
106-107. 

Senators,  United  States,  Election  of, 
by  the  people,  152 ;  preliminary 
selection  of,  by  the  people,  161. 

Separation  and  revolution,  Deep- 
lying  causes  of,  23-24. 

Settlement  of  Western  territory, 
Rapid,  37-38,  90. 

Settlers,  American,  character  of,  21. 

Seward,  William  H.,  and  Maximilian's 
empire  in  Mexico,  228-229;  pur- 
chase of  Alaska,  230. 

Sherman  Anti-Trust  Law,  176;  ef- 
fect of  enforcement,  176-177 ; 
administration  of  the,  189-190. 

Sherman  Resumption  Act  passed  in 
1875,  213,  216. 

Silver  craze  in  the  South  and  West, 
218. 

Silver  demonetized  in  1873,  214; 
large  output  of,  and  mints  closed 
to,  214—215 ;  decline  in  value  of, 
216-218;  coinage  of,  suspended 
in  France  and  by  Latin  Monetary 
Union,  217 ;  government  a  monthly 
purchaser  of,  and  notes  issued,  218- 
219 ;  purchase  stopped  by  a  special 
session  of  Congress,  219. 

Silver,  Friends  of,  in  a  frenzy,  201. 


Slave-holding  power  of  the  South 
controlled  the  tariff,  197-198. 

Slave-trade,  Foreign,  abolished,  48; 
New  England  protected  the,  24, 
227 ;  the  prohibition  of  the,  a  re- 
striction upon  immigration,  79; 
precursor  of  the  Chinese  Exclu- 
sion Act,  79 ;  of  incalculable  sig- 
nificance, 80. 

Slavery  an  ever-increasing  danger 
to  unity,  24-25 ;  forbidden  by 
Ordinance  of  1787,  38 ;  north  and 
south  of  the  Ohio,  40 ;  immense 
expansion  of,  47—49 ;  created 
differences,  50;  and  sectional 
antagonisms,  197. 

Slaves,  Demand  for  more,  80;  num- 
ber of,  80-81. 

Social  conditions,  Requirements  of, 
changing,  7. 

Sociologist,  How  the,  defines  po- 
litical life,  4. 

Sound  money  election  of  1896,  219- 
220. 

South,  Claims  of,  for  different  foreign 
and  domestic  policies,  50;  the 
intense  sentiment  of  the,  51-52; 
white  supremacy  asserted  in,  77— 
78;  must  attract  foreign  and 
Northern  immigrants,  83,  85 ; 
white  population  of,  to  grow  more 
rapidly  than  the  negro,  84 ;  a  more 
stable  political  condition  in  the, 
125 ;  the  solid,  held  by  Democratic 
politicians,  134;  changing  its  in- 
dustrial character,  200 ;  friendly  to 
England  through  cotton  trade, 
228. 

South  America,  Direct  trade  with, 
should  be  in  ships  of  American 
register,  207. 

South  American  republics  entering 
upon  economic  development,  206. 

Southern  farming,  National  policy 
toward,  83. 

Southern  Pacific  Railroad,  Land 
grants  to,  94-95. 

Southern  states,  Demand  for  Euro- 
pean labor  in  the,  66;  immigra- 
tion to  the,  the  solution  of  the 
negro  question,  67. 


INDEX 


267 


Southern  statesmen  hoped  for  a 
retreat  from  the  slave  system,  25 ; 
opposed  free  homestead  legislation, 
90-91. 

Southwest,  The,  and  our  relations 
with  Spain  and  Mexico,  227. 

Sovereignty,  Theory  of,  from  inter- 
national standpoint,  19-20 ;  minor 
and  major  state,  20;  our,  22,  29. 

Spain  and  the  Cuban  revolution,  236— 
237;  our  intervention  and  war 
with  Spain,  237-238,  242 ;  domes- 
tic harmony  after  our  war  with, 
242;  our  inestimable  service  to, 
recognized,  250. 

Spaniards  in  Mexico,  31-32,  43. 

Spanish  colonization,  Extent  and 
results  of,  30-32,  224. 

Spanish-American  republics  estab- 
lished, 226. 

Speculation  inevitable  in  settlement 
of  a  new  country,  93. 

Spoils,  To  the  victor  belong  the, 
141. 

Spoils  system  no  longer  dominant, 
144;  corrected,  153-154. 

Standard  Oil  Company  investigation, 
176. 

Standpoints,  Two,  for  survey  of 
political  life  of  a  nation,  1-2. 

State  laws  and  customs,  voluntary 
uniformity  in,  29. 

State,  Metaphysics  of  the,  3-5 ;  the 
foremost  fact  in  the  political 
structure,  6;  functions  of  the, 
13-14;  supremacy  and  stability 
of  the,  13,  14,  166;  the  people 
make  the,  16 ;  a  composite  entity, 
17 ;  elements  of  the,  22 ;  constitu- 
tional provision  for  admission  of, 
28. 

States'  rights  and  national  sover- 
eignty, Arguments  about,  his- 
torical curiosities,  28. 

Statesmanship,  Aims  of,  14-15,  36, 
39,  74,  248,  250;  of  compromise, 
227;  failure  of,  on  death  of  Lin- 
coln, 229-230. 

Suffrage,  National  universal,  122,  124. 

Switzerland,  Economic  tendencies  in, 
10. 


Tariff,  The  broadly  protective,  of 
1816,  196;  the  compromise,  of 
1833,  196;  a  double,  adopted  by 
several  European  countries,  204- 
205. 

Tariff  discussion,  Acute,  135,  194, 
200. 

Tariff  issue,  Intensity  of,  lessened 
with  growth  of  Western  and 
Southern  manufactures,  199-200. 

Tariff  question,  The,  in  our  political 
history,  194-206. 

Tariff  rates  comparatively  low  •  in 
1842,  196 ;  difficulties  in  adjusting, 
198-199. 

Tariff,  Revision  of,  more  favored  by 
Eastern  and  Iowa  Republicans 
than  by  any  section  of  Democrats, 
204. 

Tariffs,  protective,  Southern  attitude 
against,  25,  196-198;  Northern 
economic  tendencies  for,  25. 

Taxation,  Problems  of,  208-209,  212. 

Taxes,  Other  equalizing,  as  allowable 
as  tariff  discriminations,  209. 

Telegraph  and  telephone  monopo- 
listic and  also  public  services,  188. 

Temperament  of  the  American  peo- 
ple, 201. 

Territorial  governments  a  prepara- 
tion for  statehood,  35-36. 

Texas  belonged  to  Spain,  31;  re- 
tained by  Mexico,  33 ;  annexation 
of,  90;  admitted  with  slavery 
already  existing,  38;  acquisition 
of,  led  to  purchase  of  California, 
228. 

Timber  Culture  Act  passed,  110; 
failure  and  repeal  of,  111. 

Timber,  Standing,  will  be  sold  by 
government,  114;  areas  of,  should 
have  been  held  as  public  property, 
184. 

Town  meeting,  The  New  England,  35. 

Township,  The  six-mile-square,  the 
unit  of  land  measurement,  89. 

Trade,  Triangular  movement  of, 
advantageous  to  us,  207. 

Transportation,  Public  interest 
greater  than  private  in  business 
of,  177 ;  public  character  of,  186- 


268 


INDEX 


187;  a  great  industry  tending  to 
harmony,  188. 

Treasury,  Secretary  of  the,  Problems 
presented  to  the,  99. 

Tree  planting  on  prairie  farms,  110. 

Tribune,  New  York  Weekly,  and 
Horace  Greeley,  163. 

Trusts  and  combinations  created  by 
railway  discrimination,  175-176; 
exist  in  Germany  without,  187 ; 
outside  of  quasi-public  corpora- 
tions, not  all  bad,  191. 

Trusts,  Iron  and  oil,  favored  in  rates 
of  shipment,  173-175. 

Trusts,  Some,  occupy  the  entire  field, 
183 ;  government  should  super- 
vise these,  183. 

Union,  The  chief  steps  toward,  27. 

Union  Pacific  Railroad  subsidy,  94. 

United  States,  Responsibility  of, 
among  the  nations,  249-251 ;  cor- 
dial foreign  relations  of,  250. 

Utah,  Church  and  state  in,  17. 

Venezuela,  Our  policy  toward,  244; 
arbitration  with  England  on  British 
Guiana  boundary,  244 ;  a  European 
raid  upon,  ended,  245. 

Virginia  cedes  territory  now  Ken- 
tucky to  the  Union,  39;  settlers 
from,  in  Ohio,  Indiana,  and  Illi- 
nois, 38;  in  Tennessee,  Alabama, 
Missouri,  and  Arkansas,  54. 

Virginia  Resolutions,  arguments  for 
and  against  the,  25. 

Voters  register  the  social  will,  123; 
ratio  of,  to  office-holders,  128. 

Voting  system,  Devices  for  protect- 
ing, of  use,  154. 

War  debts,  Revolutionary,  of  the 
colonies  assumed  by  the  govern- 
ment, 87. 

War  of  1812  interrupted  our  foreign 
trade,  196. 

Washington,  Treaty  of,  232. 


Washington's  Farewell  Address,  225. 

Water,  Laws  and  regulations  con- 
cerning, in  Western  states,  103. 

Water  power  for  electrical  trans- 
mission will  be  sold  by  government, 
114. 

Water-supply  the  chief  asset  in  arid 
and  semi-arid  belt,  102  ;  permanent 
public  protection  of  chief  sources 
of,  104,  109. 

Webster,  Daniel,  logic  of,  25. 

Webster  and  Clay  favored  time  and 
compromises  in  political  contro- 
versy, 25 ;  national  leaders,  227. 

West,  The  great,  Spanish  territory, 
31 ;  opening  of  the,  56  ;  victim  of  its 
own  overproduction,  97—98,  101. 

West  Indies,  Results  of  our  nearness 
to,  47-48 ;  plantation  methods  of, 
adopted,  48. 

Western  Granger  movement,  135. 

Westward  movement,  The,  after  the 
Revolution,  35  ;  intensified  Ameri- 
can traits  and  institutions,  36,  53, 
92-96. 

Whigs,  The,  133. 

Whites,  The  poorer,  drifting  to  the 
mountains,  48-49 ;  of  the  South, 
its  most  valuable  possession,  84; 
economic  upbuilding  of,  necessary, 
85,  119. 

Wild-cat  currency,  210-211. 

Wilson  tariff  of  1894  and  free  raw 
materials,  203. 

Wisconsin,  Conditions  for  settlement 
of,  prescribed  in  Ordinance  of 
1787,  39. 

Woman  suffrage  in  Colorado  and 
other  Western  states,  124. 

Women,  Social,  economic,  and  po- 
litical status  of,  improved,  122- 
124 ;  safeguards  for,  in  Massachu- 
setts, 125. 

World  conferences  and  tribunals, 
Influence  and  authority  of,  251. 

World  harmony,  A  new  period  of, 
20. 

C.  A.  N. 


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